The Story of Ven
by BlueGuineaPig
Summary: (CHAPTER 1-4 RATED T) (CHAPTER 5-22 RATED M) Ven is a solemn guinea pig who lives in a small community near the hills, north of LA. When a sudden disaster strikes, Ven searches for the people responsible. With the help of his only and best friend Alexei, they set out to search this unknown enemy. Ven soon finds out the enemy is closer to him than he thinks... COMPLETED!
1. Four Young Pups

**WARNING! This is long novel with about 23 chapters. It's very graphic in a few parts, and has pretty rough language. It's my first fan fiction and I'm extremely excited to have the pleasure of anyone reading it.**

 **This novel is becoming a feature film made on Blender! Check it out on BlenderArtists .org (Search, 'Blender Feature Film: The Story of Ven')**

 **This is the prequel and the sort of sequel to G-force. The story shows the history of Darwin's family from the beginnings and their side of the story. It's mostly a original story with original characters, but G-force is involved, trust me.. It won't seem like it, but keep reading..**

* * *

Prologue

The year is 2007, two years prior to the events of G-force, and the events of clusterstorm. In Los Angeles, there is a pet shop named Elia's Pet Shop. This is the same pet shop from the first film. This book requires you to know the plot of the first film as well as the characters involved.

Chapter 1: Four Young Pups

It's early Sunday morning and Elia's Pet Shop was closed. The pet shop was located in a plaza, on the corner of a normally busy intersection. Inside the pet shop, near the center of the store, was a terrarium housing guinea pigs. There was little to no light inside, except for the emergency light that is always on, shining on the tank above. Inside the tank, there were two guinea pigs. These pigs just had a litter of four young, and is trying to keep them warm.

"Give me some more bedding," said one guinea pig.

She is talking to the father, who is gathering bedding for her. The mother, "Elliot," was a short haired light brown, almost orange and white guinea pig. The color pattern in her fur was random, and it had a small shine. The father, "Marlen" was an abyssinian guinea pig. He had somewhat rough, long brown and white fur, and had a small mohawk on top of his head. The litter consisted of three boys and one girl. The girl was chocolate brown furred with a lighter brown belly. One male was like Marlen, having rough brown and white fur, as well as being very plump. The other two males were twins. One of the twins was noticeably smaller than the other, but both had short golden brown fur, as well as white fur from the belly that crowned towards their eyebrows.

"Finally... Look at them," said Marlen. Elliot didn't respond. "Are you okay, Elliot?"

"I'm fine, just a little tired."

"Anyone would be after that drama."

Elliot drew a small smile, "What should we name them?"

"I don't know. Three boys and a girl?"

"I was thinking Lillie for the girl."

Marlen perked up, "That fat one looked like me when I was young. I'll name him after my old owner, Hurley."

"Hurley?"

"Yeah, my owner always wore a shirt that said Hurley. So I thought, if I ever had kids, I would name them the same thing."

Elliot gave a confused, sideways look, then glanced back at the kids. "What about the twins?" She points to the smaller pup. "Why is that one so small? It looks weak and fragile."

"I think we found our runt," said Marlen. "Best not to name him."

"Marlen!"

"What? We have to face the reality. Look at him, he can barely move, nevermind have the strength to drink."

Elliot looks down. "Okay.. Well, what about the other one?"

"Hmm.." Marlen looked around for clues, Elliot soon did the same. Eventually Elliot saw a diagram comparing hamsters to guinea pigs.

Elliot proposed, "How about.. Ven?"

"Ven? Like a Venn diagram?"

"But spelled V, E, N. With only one n."

"That changes it how? asked Marlen."

"It makes it unique."

"...fair enough." Marlen pointed to the pups. "Okay. So Lillie, Hurley, and Ven." He then looked over towards the runt, "And him."

"We really should name him," said Elliot.

"We can worry about that later, get some rest."

"But it's-"

"Nope, rest first."

"Okay." The weather outdoors was getting stormy, and the wind started rattling the entry door. Elliot remarked, "Sounds like a storms coming through. I hope it doesn't wake the kids." Marlen agrees, then snuggles up with Elliot, prepared to rest. A couple hours pass...

* * *

 **A very short first chapter, but does introduce a few key characters.**


	2. Escape!

Chapter 2: Escape!

The clock ticked to 9am and the weather was progressively getting worse. Loud thunder started shaking the store, causing the animals inside to get rowdy. A lighting bolt strikes near the store waking Elliot and Marlen. They look out the door and notice the violent wind picking up small debris. Becoming concerned, Elliot and Marlen cuddle to protect the litter. Meanwhile, the roof starts to leak, causing a small drip from the ceiling. The drip soon starts seeping towards the wall, leaking down towards an electrical outlet. The outlet starts popping, and smoke comes out. A burning smell starts to surround the store. The animals inside start to whimper.

"You smell that?" questioned Marlen.

"Yeah.." answered Elliot. "Is something burning?"

"I don't know."

More water enters the outlet, and more smoke begins to billow out. Eventually, a small fire breaks out. The bright light catches Marlen and Elliot's attention, and they ran to the corner of the tank to get a better view. The fire began spreading at an alarming rate, towards some plants. The two parents look at each other, fearing what might happen.

Elliot glances towards the pups, "We have to protect them!"

Marlen nods in agreement, then they scurry towards the litter. The fire started spreading towards another animals cage, causing them to whine and screech in pain. Elliot couldn't bear to watch, and closed her eyes tightly. The sound of a fellow animal burning to death haunted Elliot, but soon the screaming subsided, masked by the raging fire. Elliot then opens her eyes to see half the store caught in flames, spreading towards the tank. The fire got closer, and more animals burn.

Elliot turns to Marlen and whimpers, "I-I'm scared."

Marlen doesn't respond. Instead, he just looks back at her, squeezing tightly, and expecting the end. The building begins to creek, showing signs of instability. A wooden support beam near the guinea pigs tank catches flame, causing it to crack. Soon the ceiling above began to collapse, with debris landing in the terrarium. Elliot and Marlen take cover as dust and ash begin to carpet the tank. Suddenly, the whole support beam itself collapses and crashes onto the table holding the terrarium. The table buckles under the weight, and the terrarium slips off.

"Hold on!" screamed Elliot as they free fall onto the ground. The terrarium shatters, pieces of glass fly everywhere. Dazed and bleeding, Elliot and Marlen get up to see that the litter got separated around the tank covered in glass and bedding.

"Are you okay?!" shouted Marlen. He struggles to get up.

"I'm fine," responded Elliot, dazed.

Marlen gets up and waddles towards Elliot, "We have to get outta here!"

"B-but the kids.."

Marlen glances at the fire, still spreading towards them. In between him and the fire, were the children. Forced to accept fate, he exclaims, "Elliot... we have to go."

"W-what?" Confused and still shocked from the fall, she is unable to give a straight answer. Marlen lifts her up, and begins to run towards the exit. On the way out, Elliot looks back towards the pups, and sees a couple of them moving, and whimpering.

Suddenly, Elliot gathers a burst of energy, "N- no.. no! We're taking them!"

She escapes out of Marlen's grasp.

He rebels, "Elliot, we won't make it out!"

"We have to try!"

"How?! We don't have time!"

"Let's just-"

The ceiling collapses on top of them once more. The two duck in cover and realise they are out of time.

"JUST GRAB WHO YOU CAN AND RUN!" screamed Elliot.

In a hurry, and without thought, Elliot runs back and grabs the larger twin, Ven. Marlen rushes and grabs the female, Lillie. The two pigs scurry across the fiery floor, smoke billowing above their heads, making it hard to breath. Suddenly, the front door came in sight, shattered from collapsed debris. They approach the door and look outdoors. The crashing rain made it hard to see above ground level, but Marlen and Elliot could spot what looked like people outside of their cars, pulled over and on their cell phones with the police department.

The couple exit the building and rest outside for a moment before continuing.

Elliot puts Ven on the ground next to Marlen, "Stay here, I'm going back for the others."

Without reason, Elliot begins to re-enter the building, only to get tugged back outside from Marlen.

She turns around to Marlen shaking his head slowly, "No, I'm not gonna loose you.. too."

He gives her a peculiar look, hoping to get her to understand the situation, you can't save everyone. Elliot, stares back in denial at first, but then accepts, staring at the ground in hopelessness. Another explosion comes from the building, interrupting the conversation.

"Let's go!" shouted Marlen.

The two guinea pigs pick up their young and run along the side of the building. Luckily, the heavy rain caused a sort of mist, disguising the family as they make their escape. They continue across the street into an alleyway, a safe distance from the fire. Taking a break from running, they turn around to watch the pet shop as it burns down.

* * *

 **What happened to the runt, and Hurley?**


	3. Homeless

Chapter 3: Homeless..

Elliot and Marlen were taking cover next to a dumpster. The trash above was sheltering them from the violent rain. It was still morning, sky dark grey from the storm, and it was really loud from the rain crashing on the ground. The family watched the shop as it burned down, fire so intense that the rain couldn't put it out. Loud screaching is heard from the inside, burning animals forced to face there demise. In the distance, a siren is heard. Soon after, a fire truck came to put out the fire.

Marlen turned to see Elliot tending to the kids, "Are they alright?" He slowly walks towards her.

"They're cold, but I think they'll live." Marlen leans toward Elliot, and rests a hand on her shoulder. "We only got Ven and Lillie..." murmured Elliot softly. She lookes over towards the burning plaza in distress.

"We need to keep going," said Marlen.

"Where? We don't have a home now."

"We can make one, in the wild."

Elliot gave a puzzled look, "The wild? Do you even know where that is?"

"Yes actually, it's to the east."

"And do you know which direction east is?"

"Uh, yes. It's.. that way." Marlen points in a random direction.

Elliot glared at Marlen, "No, that's not a valid direction."

"Well we can't stay here." Elliot turned towards the burning shop again, looking at it in anguish. She contemplates for a moment, then mumbles, "Let's go," Marlen smiled then the two picked up there young and headed up the street using the weather as cover.

A few hours pass and the two pigs were still in the city, wandering around aimlessly. The weather had cleared up for the most part, and visibility had increased.

"Let's take a break," said Elliot as she stops on the sidewalk.

Marlen turns around, "C'mon we're almost there."

"Almost where? We've been walking for hours and everything still looks the same."

She looks down at Ven, hearing his stomach ache. Elliot sighs, "We need to eat..." Marlen began to look around for food, and spots a fast food restaurant down the street. There was a person taking out the trash.

Marlen smiles, "I have an idea."

Meanwhile, an old lady walking out the restaurant spots the two guinea pigs in the trash can, digging out food. Because of the weather clearing up, the family was easily spotted by the lady. She curiously moves closer to check them out. The old woman then starts looking for something to capture them with. After a few attempts, she sees a cardboard box and smirks as this is the perfect tool for capturing them. She quietly moves closer, trying not to get spotted by the guinea pigs.

"I can't believe we're eating trash!" shouted Elliot.

"This isn't trash," responded Marlen. "It's survival. And if you want to learn to survive in the wild, you're gonna have to learn to take what you can get." The old lady hears them squeaking and spots the family of four, getting ready for the surprise capture. "It's kill or be killed in the wild, you have to be aware of your surroundings."

Marlen takes another bite of an old French fry. Elliot watches Marlen as he devours the fries.

She smiles, "Heh, you're such a pig."

Suddenly the old lady jumps out and quickly smacks the box on top of the family. The guinea pigs start squeaking wildly and scurry around trying to find a way out. She closes the box from underneath, flips it over while keeping it shut, and walks towards her car. She opens the door and puts them in the backseat.

* * *

 **So they get kidnapped off the street by some random old lady, where is she taking them?**

 **About the runt and Hurley. They survive the fire, and were spotted by a firefighter upon entry of the shop. Elia's pet shop was rebuilt from the ground up to become what was in the movie. It's now its own building, and had new ownership. Upon grand re-opening of the Pet Shop, Ben the Scientist adopts the runt (Darwin) while he was still a pup, leaving Hurley behind with Bucky. Then the events of G-force happen about two years later.**

 **Q: How do you know Ben adopts Darwin from Elia's Pet shop specifically?**

 ** ** **A: In the movie, when Darwin and his team are trying to escape Killian and the FBI near the beginning, they hop into a van labeled Elia's Pet Shop. The Van was doing a supply drop off, which tells me Ben gets his pet supplies from there. This convinced me that Elia's Pet shop was where he purchased Darwin. At least in my mind :)******

 ** ** ** **Let's see where the old lady is taking the family********


	4. The Community

Chapter 4: The Community

It's almost pitch black inside the cardboard box, other than the light from the small opening at the top of the box.

"Be aware of your surroundings? Be vigilant?" Elliot nagged on. "What do you call this Marlen!?"

"I was eating! You expect me to be vigilant in the middle of chowtime?"

"Um, yes! Now because of you were stuck in this mess."

"Me!? Why weren't you being vigilant?"

"I was watching the kids! To make sure they're safe!" The old lady driving overhears the loud squeaking in the back.

"They sure seem excited," she remarked. Suddenly a cell phone rang. The woman picked it up. "Hello? Oh hey sweetie... I'm heading home right now... It was nice seeing you too... The dog will be fine, I'll feed him when I get home..."

The family listened in, "Who do you think she's talking to?" asked Marlen.

"I don't know," responded Elliot. "But I hope she doesn't mean us when she said feed the dog." The two guinea pigs look at each other in worrisome.

The ride to the old lady's home lasted hours long and was uneventful. It's late noon, and the family had fallen asleep in the cardboard box. She parks the car in the driveway, and gets out to open the rear door of the vehicle. The old lady picks up the box, waking Elliot. The guinea pigs were in the corner of the box trying to cuddle for security. Marlen was still asleep snoring near the pups. The lady walks through her home towards her backyard.

"Marlen wake up," whispered Elliot. The fat guinea pig struggles to roll around, then the box shakes and Marlen does a quick panic.

"Ahh! Don't eat me!" screamed Marlen in a sudden panic. He spots Elliot confused then takes a deep breath, the box shakes again. "What's happening?"

"I think we're here," answered Elliot.

"Where's here?" The old lady walks through the house, heading outside to her backyard. She kneels down, sets the box in the grass, and opens the top.

"Enjoy your new life," she said. The old lady stands up, and walks away back towards her home, closing the door. The bright light temporarily blinds the family. They look up in confusion,

"Is she letting us go?" asked Marlen.

"I don't know," answered Elliot as she stared into the sky. She looks at Marlen. He's putting his ear up against the cardboard wall of the box.

"I hear something outside," said Marlen.

"We need to get out," said Elliot sharply. "Grab the children!" Marlen scurries over towards the pups and picks them up. Elliot begins to throw her body onto the wall of the box, slightly tipping it over. Marlen watches then decides to join in, banging his back towards the wall. "Together!" shouted Elliot. "In 3.. 2.. 1.." Both of the guinea pigs run from one side to the box to the other jumping into the wall at the same time, knocking the box over.

Grass gets blown into the box and the family gets the first look outside of the box. Elliot crawls out onto the short grass and is blinded by the light. Once her eyes adjusted and cleared up, she saw what looked like a miniature house. She was then baffled when she looked around and saw multiple small homes. "What the... tiny houses?" she whispered to herself. Marlen followed her out in and was in awe. They heard a footstep to the right of them, the family turned sharply towards the sound and saw a group of guinea pigs looking right at them. Behind them was the rest of the miniature houses, soon the family realizes they're in a village of sorts.

"Hi there!" said the guinea pig in front of the pack. It was a deeper voice, but warm. He was a tri-colored pig with orange, black, and white all over and looked puffy but not fat. The family showed little courage and retreated back into the box. "Are you guys okay? We're not going to hurt you," The pig continued.

Elliot peeked outside towards him, "Uh.. Hi.. Who are you?"

"My name's Hector, welcome to our village."

"Village?" responded Elliot.

"Yup. This place is our home, built by the breeder."

"Breeder? W-what I'm confused."

"The lady that brought you here is who we call the breeder, she's been taking care of us for a few years now." The family gathers some bravery and comes out into the open, looking around. Hector spots Marlen but the pups caught his attention.

Another guinea pig reveals themselves next to Hector, "You guys just had a couple of pups?" It was a female black and white guinea pig.

"U-Uh, yes," answered Elliot.

"Look's like they haven't been fed all day." The pig started walking towards the family to aid them. Elliot and Marlen both take a step back in distrust. The female pig stopped and was concerned, "What's wrong?"

"I just would like some answers on what's going on here."

Hector intervened, "I can answer any questions you have, if it-" He was cutoff by two smaller guinea pigs who shoved past him. They were both tricolored and were clearly children. "Tyler! Neal!" squawked Hector.

The female pig rushed in, grabbing the children, and held them back. "Kids, calm down!" shouted the female.

The two excited pups looked at her, "I wanna meet the new people," said Tyler.

"You can soon enough, but they just got here. Let them settle in.."

"Angel, take the kids inside," said Hector towards the female pig. Angel looks at the two pups, and brought them away towards the biggest house in the area. Elliot and Marlen just stood there in slight concern, still confused on what's happening. Once the three pigs cleared the area, Hector re-focused his attention back to Elliot and Marlen. "I-I'm sorry, that was my spouse and my two sons," Hector continued. "Yeah, still pretty young so they're interested in anything that happens here."

"Those were you're children?" asked Elliot.

"Mm-hmm, they would be my third litter. I just had my fourth litter a few days ago actually. On that one we had two boys, Kelvin and Tibbetts. And one girl, Julie." The family looked baffled on how they could have so many kids. "So about those questions, walk with me through the village and I can explain everything." Hector turned around and started walking along the main dirt path. Elliot and Marlen looked at each other wondering if they should follow. Hector turned his head while walking, "C'mon." The family started moving and caught up to Hector.

Elliot first asked a question, "So where are we exactly?"

"We are in the hills of California just northeast of Los Angeles, I'm figuring you guys are from there?"

"Yes, we're from a pet shop in the city."

"Was your family bought?"

"U-Um, no.." Hector paused momentarily curious on what happened. "There was a fire.. I-In the pet shop, our terrarium broke and we barely made it out alive. Later we got picked up by that lady, she put us in that box."

"Wow a fire, so you guys are rescues."

"If you wanna call it that." Elliot rolled her eyes.

"I would say so.. You see, this village is full of people like you. Each one has a story.. Abandoned owners, neglected, abused. The breeder picks up these poor souls and places them here, so they could live a peaceful life with their own kind. Human's can be.. kind of aggressive, but also very kind, in our case at least."

"So what's with the houses?"

"I was just about to get to that. The breeder has a hobby of craft making, she builds these houses for us to live in. She also has a son that does architecture."

"Wait.. She builds them, individually!? There's like thirty houses here!"

"Twenty-two actually, soon going to be twenty-three for you guys."

"We get a house? Like to call our own?"

"Yup, pretty great huh? Each group of pigs get there own home, one per family... So about you, what's your name?"

"Elliot."

"Elliot?" Hector looks to the father guinea pig holding the pups.

"Marlen," said Marlen nervously.

"What about these two rascals?" asked Hector.

"The male is named Ven, Lillie the female," answered Elliot.

"Great names, I think you guys will fit in just fine with us."

Elliot smiles, then looks around. "So how many people are here?"

"I actually haven't done a headcount recently, but I'm gonna say around thirty somethin.."

"How long have you been here?"

"Me and Angel have been here since the beginning of the village. We were the original guinea pigs owned by the breeder and used to live inside that house." Hector points towards the old lady's home. "One day, she built a huge two story model home and couldn't store it inside, so instead she put it back here, and put us in the home. We still live there to this day." Hector looks over to the biggest home in the village. It's the largest and only two story home in the village. "Soon after my first litter, the breeder realized she needed more space for us to live and built another home. And it wasn't long after that she started buying, or in many cases, rescuing guinea pigs to put here with us. Each of them with a home to live in." Elliot and Marlen start smiling, relieved that finally they're safe. "It's been about three years now.."

Elliot looked to Hector. "S-Sorry," spurted Elliot. "But just how old are you?"

"I'm five now." Elliot and Marlen eyes open slightly in surprise. Hector looks down as if embarrassed.

"Don't feel bad, you look amazing for your age," said Elliot.

"Thanks, Angel says the same thing... Do you have any more questions?"

"No, but I am curious," wondered Elliot. "Where do we live?"

"The breeder is probably building your home as we speak, usually it takes a couple days."

"I see."

"Until then, you guys can live with me."

"Really? Do you guys have space for us?"

"Most definitely. Here, follow me." The group of guinea pigs start walking to the wooden, two-story home. "You guys are going to be downstairs in the living room," explained Hector.

Elliot asked, "Will your family mind? I really don't want my kids to be a bother.."

"Don't worry, we have newborn pups ourselves. Angel's been taking care of kids for a few litters.. She could actually give you a few pointers." While the group walks towards the home, Elliot and Marlen take a look at their surroundings. They study the other guinea pigs as they go about their day. Soon they notice a few of them gathered near a shack in the corner of the yard up against the fence to the neighbor's.

"E-Excuse me, Why is everyone near that shack?" asked Marlen.

"Oh, I almost forgot," answered Hector. "That's where we get our food rations. The breeder comes and refills the food daily every morning so we have plenty to eat. Whenever you guys are hungry, just head over there and grab some, okay?" The two guinea pigs nodded in agreement.

 ** _Hector's Home_**

The group arrives at the house and Hector invites them inside. The house was two stories high, and had a spiral staircase going from the first floor to the second. It also had a step-down in the living room. Angel was seen in the living room with a couple of small pups. She turns around, "Hey!" shouted Angel.

"Hey Angel," answered Hector. "The new family is here with me." The family walks into the house and takes a look around.

"Hi guys, welcome," said Angel.

Hector re-introduced the family, "This is Elliot, that's Marlen, they little ones are named Ven, and Lillie. They're going to stay with us until their house is ready, is that okay?"

"I'm fine with it," answered Angel. The family walks into the living room. Hector looks over towards Marlen, who was a little nervous.

"Hey, Marlen." said Hector, patting his hand on Marlen's shoulder.

"Yes?"

"Can I take you upstairs and show you around?"

"U-Uh sure." Marlen hands the pups to Elliot and walks up the staircase with Hector chatting on the way up. Meanwhile, Elliot sits near Angel, apologizing for acting nervous.

"I-I'm really sorry about earlier.. was just really scared for my family and myself."

"You're fine, I would be scared too if I went to a brand new place with newborn pups." Elliot smiled and looked toward the staircase.

"It's really cool that you have a staircase."

"Yeah, the breeder makes these model homes designed for humans, but it so happens to be the perfect size for us rodents." Elliot takes a look at the pups in Angel's arms, and asked for their names.

"The brown one is named Kelvin, the black and white one is named Tibbetts," said Angel. Both were males, one of them was a tricolor, the other was like it's mother; black and white in a oreo cookie color mix. The two continued to talk until interrupted by Marlen screaming from the second floor. Hector's two sons, Tyler and Neal were jumping onto Marlen and playing roughly. Everyone laughs and the day passes uneventfully.

* * *

 **So the old lady is a guinea pig breeder!**

 **The first decently long chapter and the last being somewhat kid friendly.**

 **This chapter introduces the whole village that our characters live in. Hector is the village leader, along with his spouse Angel. Tyler and Neal are their 8 month old kids (8 years old in human years). They also have 3 more young (Kelvin, Tibbetts, Julie). They are all 4 days old.**

 **The village itself is basically a bunch of model homes sitting in this ladies backyard. I wonder if they have power.. Probably not.**

 **My estimate: For a guinea pig 1 month to them is roughly 1 year to us. Guinea pigs live 5-7 years, so that's translates roughly to 60-84 human years.. makes sense!**


	5. Alexei

**WARNING: THE REMAINDER OF THE BOOK IS RATED M FOR LANGUAGE, AND VIOLENCE. READ ON YOUR OWN DISCRETION**

thank you

* * *

Chapter 5: Alexei

Elliot slowly opens her eyes, and turn's towards the window to see the morning light. She then turn's towards Marlen, and notices her young have disappeared. She suddenly fully awakes in a quick panic, desperately looking around for the young pups. After a few moments of silence, she hears noises coming from the staircase area. She peaks over the couch and sees Ven trying to climb the stairs. Lillie was sitting in the other corner playing on the wall. She taps on Marlen, waking him up.

"Hey, look," whispered Elliot. She points at Ven and Lillie.

"Wow, they're already mobile," responded Marlen.

After a few moments, Marlen walks up the stairs to see if anyone else is awake. He suddenly shouts from above, "Hey! Everyone's gone!"

Elliot, confused, begins to look around. She hears noises coming from outside. Curiously, she looks out the window and spots everyone walking together. They seem to be gathering towards the food shack.

"Grab the kids.. I think I know where they're at," said Elliot.

Each parent grabs hold of a pup and heads outdoors towards the shack.

 _ **The Food Shack**_

The family arrives to see the massacre of food taking place. Guinea pigs are seen taking handful's of food and shoving it in their mouths. Some are grabbing the food and sitting next to the shack, other's walking back to their homes with the food. Elliot scans the crowd for Hector, soon spotting him sitting left of the crowd eating with his family. Elliot and Marlen head in their direction getting noticed by Angel.

"Hey! Good morning!" said Angel enthusiastically.

"I see we're missing out on some grub," responded Elliot.

"Yes you are," said Hector. "Go and get some."

Elliot looks to the crowd distastefully.

Marlen spoke out, "Stay here, I'll get some for us."

He hands one of the pups to Elliot, then leaps towards the mouth watered crowd trying to get to the food. Meanwhile, Elliot sits and lets Ven and Lillie play with the other pups in the area. Lillie starts heading towards the crowd of pups trying to get some attention. She falls over into a slightly chubbier pup. He was a Abyssinian pig with longer, fluffier hair. Her fall was cushioned by the fur, and the pup helps her back up. Ven sits near the pups, but not interacting with them. Instead he studies the area and starts snooping around. Elliot and Angel watch them as they play.

"Aren't they the most precious things," remarked Angel.

"Yeah," responded Elliot. "I still can't believe we lucked out on coming here.. You know, me and Marle-"

She was interrupted by the back door opening from the breeders home. The old lady emerges from the house, carrying a large model wooden home. She starts walking through the village.

"Whoa," hollered Hector. "She made your home in one night. That's almost record breaking."

"That's our house?" questioned Elliot.

"Yup." The breeder took the home and placed it near the back of the village, but still next to the main dirt path. The placement of the house created a sort of cul-de-sac at the end of path. Marlen re-emerges from the pack of guinea pigs with a handful of food.

"Marlen look!" sputtered Elliot. She points to the breeder and the home. "That's our house!"

Marlen turns towards the breeder, "W-what?" He almost drops the food in pure shock, but quickly regains stance and looks at Elliot in excitement.

Hector stood up, "Whelp, Let's check it out guys!" The breeder walks back towards and past the guinea pigs, heading indoors once more. "Angel, can you watch the kids?" asked Hector.

"Sure."

Hector turns towards Elliot. "Is it okay with you if we leave your pups here to play while we check out the house?" Elliot looks to the area with the pups. He continues, "Angel will keep good watch of them."

"It's fine, I trust her." They start making their way to the home. Elliot sees Marlen struggling not to drop the food. "Why are you bringing all the food with you?" asked Elliot.

"I'm hungry."

"You couldn't wait until we get back?"

"Nope."

Marlen proceeds to shove his face the whole walk there. Back at the shack, Angel is still eating and watching the pups. Lillie is chasing the other pups playfully, and Ven is watching from afar. He sees a opening behind the shack, and tries to walk in that direction. Angel sees him and takes him back to the pups, putting him in the middle of the small pack. He immediately starts making his way back towards the shack.

"You're a persistent one," said Angel as she takes him back to the pack again.

Ven looks around at the pups, he starts feeling uncomfortable and starts drawing away towards the shack once more. The black and white pup, Tibbetts, approaches him. Ven immediately smacks him to the ground. Tibbetts starts crying, getting Angels attention. Ven quickly moves away out of sight and heads towards the shack. He walks all the way through and sees an exit to the village. Once out, he felt a breeze from open air, and saw the luscious landscape. He looked left and saw a house, A dark brown house secluded outside from the rest of the village. Ven start's crawling towards it.

 _ **Meanwhile**_

Elliot, Marlen, and Hector arrive at the house. "Okay," said Hector towards the family, "I'll let you do the honors." Elliot walked up to the doorstep of the home, and slowly opens the door. The home was barren; no furniture but was very clean and smelled fresh of wood glue. There was a ladder near the hallway leading towards the rooms. The ladder led up to a indoor balcony, a window at the end of the balcony.

"Oh wow," Elliot remarked. "But it's so empty."

"It's up to you to furnish the house," said Hector. "There's usually some supplies leftover from building these houses near the shack, head over there and grab some."

Elliot walks over to the big window near the front door and looks out. She can see the outside of the village; a small slope at the end of the backyard leading down to a huge valley that extends almost a mile downrange, full of trees and forestry. She looks behind the fence outside of the village, another model house, secluded from the rest. It was dark brown in color and had a front porch with a roof.

"Who's house is that?" asked Elliot.

Hector walked over and saw the house she was pointing to, "Now that house belongs to one guinea pig you shouldn't talk to."

Elliot's face puzzled. "Are they bad?"

"Well, maybe... The guinea pig that lives there is the only guinea pig who came here un-invited. I don't even think the breeder knows he's here. His name's Alexei."

"Alexei? Where'd he come from?"

"Again I don't know. Although, you could tell from his voice and attitude, he's not from around here. When we first saw him, we naturally accepted him in and allowed him to stay. He then asked if he could use our supplies to build a home."

"Wait.. he built his own house?"

"Yes, and it only took a few days too. I've never seen anyone able to do that."

"That's cool, why'd he decide to build it over there?"

"Well.. Alexei doesn't socialize with us. Every time we try heading over there to see what he's up too, he shoves us away. In worst cases, he threatens us. Really, we only see him occasionally getting food. The good thing is he hasn't demanded much since he got here a few months ago, so we just leave him be."

"I see."

"He's a special one, but for your safety, I would stay clear of him. Who knows what he could do."

"We won't get near him."

Hector looks towards Elliot, and smiles. "Well, let's check out the rest of the home."

 _ **At Alexei's home**_

Ven approaches the wooden house and sits near it, looking at the porch. Ven then starts wondering around the home and spots a window. He slowly approaches the window. Even though he is pup, Ven was able to jump up towards the window frame. He grabs on and takes a peek inside. The house was furnished, had a large couch up against the wall, and what looked like a table or workbench on the other side. Suddenly, a creek was heard near the front of the home. Ven adjusted and turned towards the noise. A guinea pig foot popped up from around the corner, then soon the whole body. It was a dark brown agouti guinea pig. He had a white muzzle going from his nose to his forehead, It's Alexei.

He looked sharply onto Ven, then bursted, in a very foreign accent, "FUCKING SHIT!"

The angry pig walked off his porch towards Ven. Ven, showing no emotion or fear ignores Alexei and continues to look into the house.

Alexei approaches mumbling to himself, "Fucking parent's can't even keep eye on their children."

Alexei continues to mumble, but now in russian. He comes up next to Ven, looking at him with disappointment. Alexei grabs Ven and shoves him off the window, throwing him away from the house. Ven lands hard and rolls a few times. He shrugs a bit, then sits back up, looking at Alexei with a very displeasured look.

Alexei lashed out, "What? You going to cry? Go away."

Alexei turns his back and walks away, mumbling to himself again. Ven refocuses his attention to the window and starts crawling towards it again. As Alexei walks up the porch, he spots Ven hopping on the window once more.

"Whoa, no no get down!" He starts racing towards Ven. "Get the FUCK off!" screamed Alexei as he grabs the back of Ven's fur and backlashes him with the knuckles from his paw.

Ven spins off the window, slamming on the ground, face down and motionless. Alexei looks pity onto Ven, staring at the lifeless body. He sighs, then reaches for the pup. Suddenly Ven comes to life and turns around looking up at Alexei, un-effected. Alexei freezes in shock and is speechless. Ven looks at the window once more and crawls to it. Alexei stares onto Ven with confusion, then looks at his paw, wondering how Ven is still conscience after being hit in the face with that much force. He tightens his fist and starts walking towards the front porch, curious to see if Ven makes it inside. As Alexei enters his home, he sees Ven crawling through the window successfully. Ven grabs the couch near the window to get grip and starts pulling himself into the home. Shortly after, he rolls down onto the soft couch and bounces.

He looks around the house for a little bit, then at Alexei. "You're dedicated aren't you?" said Alexei.

Ven turned his eyes to the couch, soon falling on his side and dozing off. Alexei watched Ven for a few moments as he fell asleep, then picked him up onto his arms. He then starts walking back towards the village to return the pup.

 _ **The Food Shack**_

As Alexei enters the village, the villagers move out of his away in fear, others just give a dirty look. He is spotted by Angel, who is still tending care to the other pups. Her expression shows worry and fear, and is baffled by the fact that Alexei is carrying Ven. Alexei stops in front of her, grabs Ven and drops him on the floor in front of Angel. Ven instantly wakes up and sharply looks towards Angel.

"I'm assuming this is yours?" said Alexei sternly.

"U-Um.. yes." responded Angel nervously. Alexei just stares at Angel, almost in boredom.

"Is he your son?" asked Alexei.

"What? N-no I was watching them for their parents." Alexei smiles a bit. "Well you're a shit babysitter."

Angel looked down at Ven. "I'm sorry, I was watching a bunch at a time."

"Don't apologize, I don't take sympathy."

"Oh."

"What's his name?"

"It's uhh.. Ven."

"Ven... Smart I'll give him that, given his age."

"Oh.. uhh, thanks?" Alexei turns away from her, as if he really didn't want to continue the conversation. He then starts walking back towards his house.

"He's also very persistent," spurted Alexei.

"I've noticed..." murmured Angel, agreeing with him. Ven starts to roam around once more, mainly towards Alexei. Angel notices and holds back Ven, "No Ven, not again!"

Angel picks up Ven and returns to the pack of pups. As she does so, Ven looks towards Alexei in the distance, squirming around trying to go back. Angel was starting to get really annoyed with the pup, and carelessly puts Ven down. She then looks over towards the village and sees Elliot, Marlen, and Hector returning from the newly built home. Angel quickly gets her act together to make it seem like she had the situation under control the whole time.

Elliot, Marlen, and Hector, are walking back from there newly built house. Hector was next to Elliot and Marlen was trailing behind.

"Yeah, later today we can gather some supplies and start building furniture," said Hector towards Elliot.

Everyone looks ahead and sees Angel, smiling with the pups.

"Hey! How was the house?" asked Angel.

"Everything was fine, no defects," answered Hector. He continued, "How were the pups, did they behave?" Angel looked towards the pack of pups, specifically at Ven. Ven stares back sharply, with a slightly agitated appearance.

She answered, "Yes... they were fine, no issues."

"That's good to hear... Do you mind helping us later building some furniture? I know you have some good ideas."

"Yeah sure, but what about the kids?"

"I can get someone to watch them in the meantime."

Elliot stepped in, "How long will it take?"

Hector answered, "Well, If all four of us start later tonight, we could get the essentials done by morning. Think you can put in the work?"

"Of course." Elliot looks at Hector and nodded her head in agreement. She starts looking back towards Marlen. "Hey, did you hear-" Marlen was nowhere to be seen. Elliot glanced around trying to spot him. "U-Uh where did he.." She soon spots him in the crowd stuffing his face with food. Elliot's face filled with dismay, as she watches him eat. "You know, I'm not even mad."

 _ **Elliot and Marlen's Home**_

Nightfall approaches, all of the supplies have been gathered, and the four guinea pigs are building furniture in the new home. Hector is in the living room, showing Marlen how to build a table. Ven and Lillie are in the corner of the living room near the window, gated off so that they couldn't run around. Elliot and Angel are seen in one of the rooms trying to build a bed.

"OK.." spoke Angel. "Hand me a nail."

Elliot turned to the stack of supplies and grabs a small nail. As she picks it up, a large explosion is heard outside, it echoes throughout the village. Elliot and Angel both turn towards the window to investigate the noise.

"Where was that from?" asked Elliot. A second smaller explosion is heard, it came from Alexei's home.

"Oh," murmured Angel. "It's Alexei doing his experiments or something."

"Experiments?"

"No one knows for sure.. He's always building something, or working on a project."

"I would like to know what he is building to be causing things to explode."

"Me too.."

As they discuss, Ven gets up and curiously peeks out the window towards Alexei's house. He peers at the home, wondering what's happening inside. A third explosion is seen, the light glares off Ven's eyes, but his expression doesn't change.

 ** _The next morning_.**

The sun comes up, shining into the house. Everyone is asleep, except for Ven, who woke up earlier than the rest. He looks around the gated area he is confined in. He crawls up towards the gate, then turns towards Lillie to see if she is still asleep. Ven turns his attention to the gate, and gazes towards the top of the wooden gate. He begins to climb and, almost effortlessly, makes it over and lands on the floor. He checks to see if he woke up anyone, then makes his way outdoors.

The morning breeze rushes through Ven's fur as he looks around in the village. No one is around, as everyone is still asleep. Ven quickly spots Alexei's home, somewhat obstructed by another house and starts roaming towards it. Ven comes up to the nearby home and quietly gets behind it. He then peers around the corner to get a better view of Alexei's house. Alexei is seen off his front porch looking at a tree that's near the fence to the neighboring yard. He is wearing something to what appears to be a belt around his waist, although unclear from the distance Ven was at. Ven, curious, begins to move closer towards the brown guinea pig. Suddenly, Alexei moves very sharply, taking something out of the belt and aims it towards the tree. Ven stopped suddenly to see what was happening. Three distant pops came from the object Alexei was carrying, followed by Alexei cart-wheeling to the side. Once again three more pops came from the small object. Pieces of wood chipped off the tree at the same time the noises were heard. Finally, two more pops came from the unknown object, then Alexei suddenly puts it back into his belt. After a few more moments of Alexei studying the tree, he begins to make his way back inside his home. Ven, once more continues on towards the house, eager to find out what Alexei is up too.

 _ **At Alexei's home**_

Alexei walks inside his home, and gets into his living room. He starts to unbuckle the belt he was wearing and puts it onto the table near his couch. Feeling tired after a workout, Alexei throws himself onto the soft, makeshift couch and begins to doze off.

Suddenly, Ven appears on the window, peeking into the dark wooden home. He spots the belt Alexei was wearing, and notices the bulky pouch on the side of it. Curious to see more, Ven hops off the window and makes his way around the front of the home, and gets onto the porch. The woods creaks as Ven progresses up the small steps. He attempts to stand up straight to look around, he wobbles but successfully keeps balance. Slowly, Ven creeps up against the wall, towards the front door. It was open, due to the wind pushing it around.

He enters the home to be greeted by a small hallway that leads left and right. The left side was dark, and led into a room that had the windows covered to keep light out. The right side was much brighter and it led to the living room. Ven looked both ways but goes towards the living room. As he slowly roams around the corner, he spots Alexei, on his couch napping. The living room was a little cramped but everything was able to fit. On the left was a workbench, up against the corner. On the right was the couch. An L-shaped couch that followed down the wall, under the window, then straight out towards the center of the room. Next to the couch was a wooden table. On top of the table was a leather belt with a pouch. Ven glares at the pouch and slowly crawls towards it, trying not to wake up Alexei.

He approaches the pouch, grabs onto the table, and lift's himself up to get a better look. The pouch was dark brown, the same color as the rest of the belt. It appears to be closed by a small pin. Eager to see what's inside, Ven pulls the latch that's on the pin, and the flap opens, revealing the contents inside. The object inside was black, and looked like it fit snug in the pouch. There was a second item as well, in its own snug compartment. Ven picks up the pouch and brings it closer to get a better look. Suddenly, the two items slip out of the pouch and onto the floor, making a loud thud.

The mysterious item is a pistol, and the pouch turned out to be a holster! A black Makarov on the ground, and next to it, a magazine, with ammo loaded! The Makarov had black grips and a star on the grip, as well as a magazine in it. The loud thud awoke Alexei, and he spots Ven on the floor next to the holster, holding the pistol, looking down the barrel. It took a second for Alexei to realize the situation, then suddenly bursts out in a panic.

"W-wha, whoa whoa!" Alexei gets off the couch and rushes towards Ven.

He snatches the pistol from Ven and shoves him aside. "What the fuck are you-, how the fuck-"

He stops short and glares sharply at Ven. Meanwhile Ven sits there motionless, watching Alexei put the gun away back into the holster. Alexei turns and tosses the gun towards the couch, then returns his attention on Ven.

He rolls his eyes and sighs, "What do you want, why are you back?" He kneels down in front of Ven. Ven gives no response, but does turn his head towards the holster and reaches his hand towards it.

Alexei quickly smacks it down, "No! That is a dangerous weapon, it will kill you if-"

Ven, blatantly ignoring Alexei, begins to crawl around him towards the pistol.

Alexei sighs again and thought to himself, "Holy shit what the fuck is wrong with this kid."

Ven attempts to climb on the couch and reach for the pistol, but was too slow as Alexei snatches it from his reach. Ven reaches his arm towards the weapon once again. Alexei thought for a moment, then an idea popped in his head.

"You really want this?" said Alexei. "Here, let me show you why this is bad."

He wraps the belt around his waist and grabs Ven, carrying him to the front of the house.

Outside in front of the porch, Ven is thrown from Alexei's arms out beside him. Alexei un holsters the pistol, looks at it, then back at Ven. Ven stares at the Makarov as it waived around in the air. Alexei takes the magazine out, there are no rounds. He opens the holster to a special compartment and takes out a separate magazine, fully loaded with eight rounds. He loads it into the gun, then takes the old magazine and puts it in the compartment.

Alexei pauses for a moment, then flips the safety to 'fire' and cocks the weapon. Ven continues to glare at the weapon, curious on what's happening. After another pause, Alexei aims the gun towards Ven, and almost without thought, presses the trigger.

A ear piercing sound echoed along the tree line. The bullet whizzes past Ven into the ground next to him. Ven's ears start ringing, and tumbles over to his side, disoriented from the loud bang. He squirms around on the grass from pain. Alexei smiles and fires two more rounds into the ground in front of Ven. The ringing intensified, and Ven was almost completely immobilized in shock.

"And now you know," uttered Alexei.

He sets the safety on the gun and re-holsters it. Alexei returns to his home leaving Ven outside. He takes off the belt and holster and tosses them onto the couch, then returns outside. Alexei looks onto the spot Ven was sitting. He wasn't there.

"What the-" murmured Alexei to himself as he starts looking around in search of Ven. "Maybe I scared him off..."

He steps out fully onto the porch and looks around with no luck of finding the young pup. He smirks in self accomplishment, then turns around towards his front door. As he enters his home, he was interrupted by a creaking noise to his left. Alexei turns his attention to his porch steps and was boggled by what he saw. Ven, almost unaffected, was climbing the porch stairs to follow Alexei into his home.

The baffled Alexei thought to himself, "He's not affected by the sound of a gun? He just shook it off in seconds.."

He watches the brown guinea pig successfully climb the stairs and begins to walk towards Alexei, resting next to him.

"He's just a pup and already has the strength to walk.."

Alexei walks indoors towards the living room and keeps the door open for Ven. Ven, not surprisingly, follows Alexei indoors and once again sits next to him.

"He also has a very strong attachment to me."

Ven looks up at Alexei, with no expression, almost as if he's studying the pig. Alexei notices this, and looks onto Ven.

He remarks, "You're special Ven.. You have the potential to be something great... Ya know, back home you would be a perfect candidate for-"

He stops suddenly and looks at the holster in the living room. It had cryllic writing on the side reminding Alexei where he's from. He looks back at Ven, determined.

"You _are_ going to be something great." He quickly picks up Ven and begins to make his way towards the village in a rush.

* * *

 **Fun Fact: This chapter was so long that I had to split it up. Even then it's still a decently long chapter; the longest thus far.**

 **So wait? Who is Alexei? Where did he come from? A Makarov? They make pistols for guinea pigs?**


	6. Gifted

Chapter 6: Gifted

 _ **At The Village**_

Everyone is still asleep as Alexei enters the village. He searches the area for the biggest home, Hector and Angels home. He spots the two story home and marches his way towards it. Alexei approaches the front door and knocks loudly without hesitation. Inside, Hector awakes groggy and confused by the noise. He gets up and begins to make his way downstairs. Alexei, getting impatient, puts Ven down and kicks the door open. Hector shrieks is surprise and backs away from the door. Alexei enters the home and is spotted by Hector.

"Alexei?!" sputtered Hector. "W-What the hell do you want!?"

"I need to ask you something."

"OK... Why did you kick the door open?"

"I was getting impatient."

"I'm walking down the stairs! You couldn't wait ten more seconds?"

"No, this is important."

"Also, there's no locks on these doors, you could've just opened it.."

Alexei pauses and turns towards the splinted door. "It seemed more fun."

"More fun!? Damn, Alexei now we have to-" Hector notices another pig enter the house. It was Ven. "Ven? What's he doing here?"

"I brought him here."

"What?.. Why? You kidnapping pups now?"

"Isn't he yours?"

"No, he's Elliot and Marlen's kid."

"Where are they?"

"Why do you wanna know?.. Better said, why do you have their kid?"

"Don't worry about it."

"I will.. Their safety is in my hands."

"Well then, I'm kicking every door down till I find them."

Hector hesitates for a moment looking Alexei eye to eye. "Alexei, I-I can't let you do that."

 _"Come here and stop me then."_ Alexei stands ground as he watches Hector make a move. Hector pauses for a moment and begins to feel overwhelmed by Alexei's aggression.

"I... can't," shrugged Hector.

"Okay then, where do they live?"

"They're the newest family here, so look for the freshly built house in the far corner of the village." Hector points in the direction of the home. "That way."

Alexei smirked, "Thanks." He picks up Ven and exits the house, attempting to close the door behind him. Hector sits on the floor, relieved that no real conflict took place.

"Alexei, what are you up too?" Hector murmured to himself.

 _ **Meanwhile,**_

Alexei walks around the sleepy village trying to spot the home Hector was talking about. He stops searching at the fact that all of the homes look the same. He turns his attention on Ven, who is reaching out to a particular house.

"This one?" spoke Alexei.

Ven continues to stretch his arm out to the home. Alexei smiles, and begins walking towards it. He approaches the newly built home and knocks on the door. Footsteps were quickly heard inside the home, a few seconds later the door opened. It was Elliot, groggy from just waking up. Before a word even came out of her, she saw Ven in Alexei's arms.

" _Ven!?_ " spurted Elliot. Almost immediately, she regained full conscience and sharply turned towards the pen that was holding both Ven and Lillie. The pup wasn't there, but instead in this strangers arms. She looks down in confusion, then returns her attention back on Ven, who is looking at her. "How did you get out?" she asked, as if Ven was going to answer back. She then gives her attention to Alexei, "I-I'm so sorry if he caused any trouble."

"Oh he did," answered Alexei. Elliot's expression changed, knowing that the conversation may not be pleasant. "But don't apologize, are you his mother?"

"Yes."

"I want to say you have a very special pup here."

"Uh.. thanks.. Who are you?"

"I'm your neighbor, I live over there." Alexei points towards his home in the distance. Elliot's expression changed into confusion, then turned towards the dark brown guinea pig.

"Um, that's Alexei's home I believe," said Elliot.

"That's me.."

"Wait.. You're Alexei?"

"I am."

Elliot paused for a moment, then cleared her mind. "What are you doing with Ven?"

"He came to me, this is twice now."

"Twice!?" Elliot shook her head, "C-can I have him back?"

"Well.. This is going to sound a bit harsh, but I'm taking your son."

"Wait, what.. Why?"

"Like I said, he's a very special pup. His mental and physical skills are beyond most at his age. I'm going to raise him myself, and train him to be something great."

Elliot stares into Alexei, not understanding what he's talking about. "Well I appreciate the kind words about Ven, but I'm not gonna let you take my son." Elliot begins to reach for Ven and yanks him out of Alexei's arms. Alexei allows her but remarks.

"I don't think that's your choice to make."

She puts Ven on the ground behind her and turns back to Alexei, "Well it's definitely not yours."

"Correct."

Elliot raises her eyebrow in puzzlement. She thinks to herself, "This guy is nuts.." She then glances down and sees Ven crawling out the door towards Alexei. Alexei gave a reassuring look, as if he knew that was going to happen.

"See?" said Alexei. "This is what I had to deal with since yesterday."

"What did you do to him?" demanded Elliot.

"I didn't do shit, he's extremely attached to me for some reason."

"Maybe you brainwashed him in one of your experiments."

"W-what the fuck? Experiment? Lady what kinda pig you think I am?"

"A psychopath who condemns himself from the rest of the village and conducts experiments on children!"

"Damn girl! Who tells you this shit?"

"I've heard a lot of things about you.."

"Fuck well you know at least I'm nice enough to tell you I'm taking the damn kid. I've shoulda just kidnapped him and called it good so I don't have to deal with your shit."

There was a momentary pause in the conversation. "You're not taking Ven," exclaimed Elliot.

Alexei sighs, "Listen.. When Ven first came up to my home yesterday, I didn't want to deal with him, so I brought him back."

"Who did you bring him back too?"

"I brought him back to that one black and white pig... Angel."

"Angel? Yesterday?"

"Yeah, when everyone was eating. That shit show of a babysitter didn't know how to handle herself when I dropped him off."

"Well that explains why she was acting a bit weird.."

"Excuse me?" interrupted Alexei.

"N-nothing.. go on."

"Anyway, earlier this morning, I see this little shit again, messin with my stuff. After many attempts to make him leave, he ended up just sticking by my side. I've learned since then, that he was no ordinary pup. He gives off this strong willed, determined vibe, which, back home, are perfect traits to become a warrior."

"A warrior? He's just a pup, what is he gonna fight?"

"Not fight, protect."

"Okay... 'Protect' what?"

"The village.. maybe.." He glances down at Ven. "He's gifted, and has a capability that most guinea pigs don't have. I'm not gonna let potential like that go to waste."

Alexei looks back up at Elliot, who was astonished by the words, but still unaccepting.

"Thanks, but your not taking him." She once again snatches Ven, but this time, puts him in the pen with Lillie. The door stays open with Alexei watching.

"That's not gonna stop him, trust me," bellowed Alexei. Elliot ignored the brown guinea pig, returning to the front and slamming the door on him. Alexei chuckles a bit, "Okay well I'll see ya later today."

He begins to roam back towards his home. As he leaves, Elliot leans on the front door, making sure Alexei won't kick it down. The whole conversation awakes Marlen, who was in the bedroom. After the door slams, he comes out into the living room and wonders what happened.

"Elliot?" She was stunned by the conversation, and didn't acknowledge Marlen at first. He walks closer, "Who was that?"

Elliot finally turned over and answered, "It was Alexei..."

"Alexei..? What was he doing here?"

"He was returning Ven." Marlen gazed over to the pen and saw Ven and Lillie, sitting there nonchalantly. "Ven? He escaped?"

"Apparently.."

Marlen noticed the subtle trembling in Elliot, "Why do you looked so worried?"

"Alexei's not a easy person to talk too," she responded.

"What he do?"

Elliot hesitated, "He want's to take Ven."

"What? Like kidnap him?"

"Something like that... He says Ven is special and has abilities that no other guinea pig has. He wants to raise him up and train him to.. uh.. protect the village."

"So Ven has powers.."

"According to him, yes."

Marlen rolls his eyes, "Sounds like a nut job. Hector was right about him."

Elliot gets off the door, and glares at Ven. "Let's keep a sharp eye on Ven today, just to be safe," exclaimed Elliot.

"Okay," answered Marlen.

 ** _Alexei's home_**

Alexei approaches his home, and appears to be contemplating something. He stops at his front porch, and surveys his home. He turns around and looks at the village, gazing at it with ambition in hopes for Ven to return. He then walks up his porch steps and sits down on a homemade wooden chair. Alexei closes his eyes and begins to nap, smiling softly.

 ** _A few hours later, back at Elliot's house_**

It's almost noon, Elliot continues to build furniture while Marlen keeps a close eye on the pups. Marlen is sitting next to the playpen, studying Ven.

"Special, huh?" whispered Marlen to himself. "You're not doing anything special.." Ven is crawling around the pen, looking around, and occasionally dabbling at the wooden playpen fence. Lillie was playing with a wooden stick given to her for entertainment. "Hmm.." muttured Marlen in disappointment.

"How are they?" hollered Elliot from another room.

"They're fine."

"Are they doing anything wierd?"

"No.. nothing at all, they're just sitting here."

"You think you can give me a hand real quick?"

"What if they escape?"

"I highly doubt they'll escape in 10 seconds.." Marlen drew his eyes onto Ven, then walked over towards the hallway, entering the room. He sees a mess of wood on the floor, as well as Elliot, covered in saw dust.

"Mind helping me move this extra wood out?" asked Elliot. Marlen nods and begins to pick up some debris in the area, he spots the bed she made.

"Looks good." said Marlen.

"Thanks."

"Do you think we can make a chair next?" asked Marlen.

While the two converse, Ven turns towards Lillie who is playing with the stick. He pauses for a moment.

"You didn't even work today," said Elliot. "You just sat down and watched the kids."

"Yeah, on the floor.. for two hours.. Not comfortable."

"You'll live, we need to finish making beds first, we got one more to go."

Suddenly a loud thump was made from the living room. The couple stopped and looked at each other, then rushed to the living room, dropping everything they had. They quickly look over to the playpen to see if Ven went missing. He was still there, sitting patiently. Elliot and Marlen exhaled heavily in relief.

"Okay, I'll move the bed." spoke Elliot. "Stay there and watch them."

Marlen nods and sits down near the pups once again, studying them. He sees Lillie come up to the fence of the playpen, and stick her arm through, reaching for something.

"What's wrong?" said Marlen softly. Lillie looks to the other side of the room, continuing to reach her hand to something. Marlen turns towards the direction of her arm, and sees the piece of wood she was playing with. It was sitting on the opposite end of the living room. Marlen was mystified, "How did that end up over there?" He looks back at Lillie and Ven, with innocent faces. Marlen then gets up, walking towards the stick. He picks it up, studying it and turns back around. _Ven disappeared_ , almost instantly. Marlen paused for a moment to understand what had just happened. "Uhh.. What!?" shrieked Marlen.

"What happened?" shouted Elliot from the next room.

"Uhh, _it_ happened." Elliot walks into the living room, looking at Marlen.

"What do you mean, _it_ happened?" She looks over towards the playpen, and sees that Ven is missing. Her expression changes, then she glances back at Marlen. Suddenly they go in a panic, searching everywhere in the house. Elliot shouts, "How'd you lose him!?"

"I literally turned my back for five seconds! I have no clue!"

"Damn it Marlen!"

"How is this my fault!?" The couple scramble around the house, searching every corner possible.

"The front door is closed, right!?" exclaimed Elliot.

"Yeah, I don't think he knows how to open doors."

"Actually now I wouldn't be surprised, he did just jump out of the playpen."

"Well I didn't hear the door open..."

"Maybe he didn't get out through a door..." Elliot walks into the master bedroom and sees a window open in the corner, a breeze rushed inside.

"What? A window?" asked Marlen.

"Yup.." The couple walked to the window and peeked outside. "Check around the outside of the house, he couldn't have gotten far... I'll watch Lillie."

Marlen nodded and rushed outdoors, checking the perimeter of the house. He then checks the surrounding area and nearby homes, with no luck. After a few minutes, he returns to Elliot.

"Did you find him?" asked Elliot.

Marlen, gasping for air, responded, "No, I have no clue where he could be."

Elliot looks up to the roof and sort of rolls her eyes. "Jesus, Alexei _was right_ about him." She turns towards the window and sees Alexei's home in the distance. "Wait a minute.." she murmured to herself. Suddenly the answer came to her, "Marlen, I know where Ven is."

 ** _At Alexei's Home_**

The wind breezes through Alexei's fur as he naps. The pup, Ven was on the staircase watching Alexei as he naps. Suddenly, Alexei opens his eyes and looks left on the porch stairs, and slightly grins. He gets off his chair, hops off the porch and walks towards the big oak tree. Ven watches Alexei for a second, then begins to follow. Alexei arrives at the tree, looking up into the branches and leaves, drafting out a plan. Ven finally catches up and sits next to Alexei, looking up into the tree as well.

Alexei turns his attention to Ven, "Ready?"

The pup continues to stare at Alexei, but has a reassuring expression. Alexei reaches down and picks up Ven, putting the young pup on his back, Ven holds on tightly. Then suddenly, Alexei leaps onto the tree, climbing towards the top. He rustles through the leaves, and hops branch to branch effortlessly all the way up. At the top, the wind is intensified and the braches are weaker, beginning to bend under Alexei and Ven's weight. They look at the village from above, as well as the entire neighborhood. After a few moments of taking in the scenery, Alexei plucks Ven off his back, putting him on the branch next to him. As he does so, he looks down through the branches, and spots two guinea pigs walking near his home. Alexei expression changes, as if he knows exactly who they are. He jumps down the tree, leaving Ven at the top. Ven watches characteristically.

"Do you see him?" asked Elliot faintly.

"No, where's Alexei?" said Marlen.

"I don't know." Suddenly, Elliot spots Alexei walking from the tree casually.

"Wait.. There he is!" bellowed Elliot. Marlen turns and sees her pointing at Alexei. They both rush towards him, arriving at the same time. "Okay, I know you have him.." spoke Elliot. Her tone was sharp and dominant.

"I do.." responded Alexei. Marlen steps in, acting rather aggressive.

"Then where's Ven!?"

Alexei glares at Marlen, then turns to Elliot, "Who's the fat ass?" Marlen shoves Elliot behind her and takes control.

"Answer my question!" Marlen attempts to tower over Alexei, "That's my son, and I'm not gonna let you kidnap him!"

"MARLEN PLEASE!" interrupted Elliot. "We're not here to fight.." she turns to Alexei. "W-where is Ven? I just want to make sure he's safe." Alexei sees Elliot's desperation, and points up to the tree where Ven is located. The worried parents look confused.

"Under the tree?" asked Marlen.

"Not under.." Alexei continues to point at the top. Elliot and Marlen inspect the tree, and spot a small brown fur ball at the top.

"WHAT!? VEN!" shouted Elliot.

Marlen mumbles to himself, "That's not safe.."

Elliot continues, "How'd he get up there!?"

"I put him there," answered Alexei.

"How?!"

"I climbed.."

"You can climb trees!?"

"You ask a lot of questions.."

"Well I wonder why when people are trying to kill my son."

"Ha!.. Ven will live... watch."

Alexei sits on the ground, closing his eyes, while everyone else stands on their toes, anxious to see what happens. Ven still sits a top the giant tree, looking around. He spots a small branch, slightly lower than him. He prepares himself, then jumps. It was a perfect jump, landing right on the branch. Then suddenly, the branch breaks, putting Ven in a free fall. Elliot and Marlen gasp, closing there eyes. Alexei peeks open one eye, curious on what happened. The sound of branches hit the ground in front of them. The two parents open their eyes, and prepare themselves to see the remains of their only son. Ven wasn't on the ground, but in fact still in the tree. Holding on to a branch, and hanging in mid air, the small pup was perfectly fine. Elliot and Marlen breath again, relieved that Ven was still alive. Alexei smiled and closed his eyes again. Ven picked himself up, and tried to find another way down. He crawls to the center of the tree, and spots a series of thick branches leading towards the bottom. Without hesitation, he hops to the next branch, landing perfectly. Ven continues to make his way down the tree, effortlessly jumping branch to branch till he gets to the first layer of branches near the tree trunk. He looks down at the trunk, digs his claws into it and slides down to the base of the tree.

Elliot and Marlen are dumbfounded; they stare at Ven as he nonchalantly walks to Alexei, sitting next to him. Alexei opens his eyes and spots Ven, in front of him, peacefully sitting as if nothing happened.

He stands up, "Good," spoke Alexei. "The training can start."

Marlen begins to step back towards Alexei's home, "I need to figure out what just happened.." spoke Marlen. He paces back to the home, startled.

Elliot steps up, "W-what was that all about?"

"Again with the questions..."

"Uh, I just saw my three day old son climb down a full size tree!"

"As expected... I told you, Ven's abilities are beyond his age, thus why it needs to be trained."

"Isn't there a less dangerous way to prove that?"

"Nope, Ven won't be at his best unless he's put in a life or death situation."

"What do you mean, how do you know that?"

"It was proven... Back home, all pups at birth are put through a test. This test was to see if their reflexes were fast enough for physical training. All of the passing candidates were put up for selection. Those that were picked, became greatness."

"What about the ones that failed, where'd they go?"

"Nowhere, because they died."

"They were killed?"

"Yes. The test was very dangerous, they died. It's a way to flush out the weakness."

"Sounds cruel.. What about you? Did you escape?"

Alexei shrugs, "No, I was one of the top performing pigs, special forces."

"Special forces.. For what, like the military?"

"Yeah, but not for this country."

"Well, you sound like you're from another country." Ven begins to crawl up to Alexei, picking at his fur. "So, did Ven pass the test?" asked Elliot.

"He did."

Elliot glared at Ven, and seemed to accept defeat. She rolls her eyes and sighs, "You know you're basically kidnapping my son.."

"In all fairness, he came to me... But is it kidnapping when you know where he is at all times?"

"True... How long is this training?"

"Until I think he's ready." She gives Alexei a blank stare.

"Fine... You can train him, but he'd better know where his real family lives."

"Thanks, but I wasn't asking for parental permission." Elliot peered at Alexei with a small smirk, expecting a response like that. She turns away and returns to Marlen, who was sitting on the staircase, finally calm from the argument.

Marlen turns to her, "So what happened?" he asks.

"Ven is gonna stay and get trained."

"What!?"

"Ven will be okay, I think we can trust Alexei."

"Trust? Elliot, remember what Hector said about him? He's dangerous..."

"But Hector doesn't know him like I know him now. I'll explain on the way back." Elliot and Marlen begin to walk back to the main part of the village, glancing at Ven and Alexei one last time.

Ven and Alexei continued training the whole day and it was becoming dark. After the last exercise was finished, Alexei went indoors to prepare some food. Ven followed in and jumped onto the couch, peeking over the top, watching Alexei cook. Once finished, Alexei grabbed a bowl and gave some food to Ven, who was still on the couch. Alexei ate on the table near the kitchen. The two chowed down on food without hesitation completely finishing the bowl. Alexei then turned over to Ven who was being more quiet then usual. He got up from the table and curiously peeked around the corner of the couch, Ven was asleep. His food bowl was empty, and was hanging off the edge. Alexei watched Ven as he slept, contemplating something.

Back at the village, Elliot and Marlen finished up building furniture in all the rooms with the help of Hector and Angel, who was visiting earlier in the day; Elliot had explained what happened about Alexei and Ven, and chose to leave them alone, with Hector agreeing. Marlen had fallen asleep as Elliot finalizes the furniture placement. She heads towards Lillie, who was peacefully playing with the makeshift toys in the area. Elliot picks her up, and brings her into her new room. Lillie's room was pretty basic at the moment, with a simple makeshift crib and some cabinets. Inside the crib, was some soft bedding for Lillie to sleep in; Elliot puts her in, and watches Lillie get comfortable with her new surroundings. Suddenly a knock from the front door. Elliot peeks out into the hallway and see's Marlen who is un-interrupted by the sound. She then quickly walks to the front door, and opens it. No one was there, Elliot then looked down and saw Ven, sleeping on the grass.

"Ven?" whispered Elliot. She gave a confused expression, and looked around for anyone who might have dropped him off. Un-hesitantly she picks up Ven, and shuts the door. Elliot decides to put Ven in his newly built room, but stops suddenly. She dazes at the pup, peacefully sleeping around her arms, and hugs him tightly. She continues into the room, which similarly looks like Lillie's, and puts Ven into the soft crib. Feeling concerned, Elliot brings some bedding from her own room and decides to sleep on the floor next to Ven's crib.

 ** _The next morning_**

A small breeze from the morning air creeps into Ven's room, and awakes Elliot. She yawns, then rolls upward and sits up straight, looking outdoors. She looks to the right and see's Ven's crib, unmoved. Elliot stretches and gets up, looking into the crib, Ven is missing. Her eyes open wide, then desperately digs around the bedding. She then looks around the room, searching for her once again missing son. She pauses for a moment, then looks out the window, studying it. She sighs and leans on the window, looking outside into the distance. She spots Alexei's home, and sees Alexei running around the house, with a smaller figure following. Elliot lays her arms on the window frame in defeat, and watched as the two guinea pigs train for the day.

* * *

 **The last chapter for this timeline. It took a moment to edit, and I feel I could edit it more. **I'm not a professional writer at all, but I do want to improve on it. This is my first time writing anything this long. So any suggestions and tips for writing I would appreciate.****

 ** **So, Alexei is special forces?****

 **Alexei is a guinea pig sent from Russia to spy on America's defenses. He ended up losing communication with home base, and decided to retire and settle in America. He kept all of his gear given to him and forcefully retired to the guinea pig community you see here.**

 **The people Alexei worked for is Russia's version of G-force, although much more organized and built. They're a Private Military Company contracted by the Russian Federation using animals as spies, called S.O.A.D "Special Operations Animal Division". They don't just use guinea pigs, but use birds, squirrels, and any animal they can train. Guinea pigs were their choice for sabotage however, being small and unnoticeable. They manufactured miniature weapons for the animals, as well as giving them special gear depending on the mission.**


	7. Two Years Of

Chapter 7: Two years of...

As the weeks pass, Ven's motor skills get refined and his training get's more difficult. Alexei teaches him how to survive in harsh climates, as well as teaching him how to escape and evade enemies. He teaches Ven how to use his Makarov pistol skillfully and tactically, and teaches him a fighting form used is Russia's special forces. Two years pass, many adventures were made by Ven, and all of the village members. Ven is now two years old (twenty-four in human years), and Alexei is four (fourty-eight in human years). Alexei is growing old, and is unable to move as fast as he used to be.

* * *

 **The shortest chapter ever... It's really only here because there is such a time gap between these next chapters.**

 **I still have plans for the two years of adventures. They're more like episodes of adventures with Ven and members of the village. Members like Tibbetts, Alexei, Lillie, and others would be involved in stuff like, "Christmas with Ven" or "Halloween with Ven". Mainly short stories..**


	8. Another Day

Chapter 8: Another Day

 _ **Elliot's / Ven's home**_

Ven open's his eyes, and sees the morning sunshine gleaming into his room and on his face. He slowly gets up and sits aside his bed looking down at the floor, trying to wake up. A few moments pass, but gathers the strength to get up onto his feet. He walks out of his room into the hallway, and passes by Lillie's room. She's awake, and appears to be pampering herself. Lillie was fully grown now, but still had the soft brown fur with the lighter brown belly. Her room had a CD player hooked up to a small speaker, playing hip-hop. Ven pauses for a moment to peek into the room as he walks by. Lillie doesn't notice Ven because she's fixated on trying to comb her hair. Ven then passes by his parent's room, and spots Elliot and Marlen still asleep in their cots. He notes their presence, but doesn't acknowledge them. Ven continues into the living room then out the front door. The morning breeze rushes through Ven's fur as he looks around the village. The village had more homes than before and was lushing with guinea pigs, about forty in total. It's breakfast hour, and everyone in the village was roaming about. Some were having conversations, others maintaining their homes. But most were drawn towards the shed where the breeder stores and serves the food. Ven began to walk across the village, wandering his way towards the shed. On the way there, he passes by the main two story house where Hector and Angel used to live.

Hector passed away about a year ago due to age, and was taken by the breeder. Angel soon passed after from health problems, due from depression and stress of being alone. The guinea pigs that reside now are Hector's third and fourth litters. Tyler, from the third litter, is the dominant in the household. He controls the whole village, along with his spouse, and does it well. His brother, Neal, assists him in managing the village. The fourth litter, Kelvin, Tibbetts, and Julie, also reside in the house. Kelvin is the dominant from that litter and often gets in fights with Tyler for control of the house. Tibbetts is a special guinea pig, diagnosed with a mental disease similar to autism. He often gets bullied due to his personality and is not liked by any of his siblings. Nowadays he separates himself from his family and sits by the edge of the hill behind the village, surveying the trees and relaxing to nature's sound. Julie is Lillie's best friend. They hang out daily, and usually gossip to each other about the village. These girls are the most popular in the village, as well as being the most beautiful.

As Ven passes by the home, he is spotted by Tibbetts from the second floor.

"Good morning Ven!" shouted Tibbetts.

Ven didn't acknowledge, and continued to the shed.

"Hey Ven! Good morning!" he repeated in the same tone.

Once again Ven didn't acknowledge, or even turn his head.

"Hmm.. I wonder if he can hear me?" said Tibbetts to himself. "Maybe if I scream louder..." The black and white guinea pig forms a cone in front of his mouth to amplify his voice. " _VEEEN_!"

"Can you like, shut up!?" A female voice came from behind Tibbetts at the doorway. It was a mixed tricolor, with a flare of light brown fur on the right side of her face.

"Hey Julie," said Tibbetts. "Did you wanna say hi to Ven?"

"No, stop yelling at random people."

"Ven's not a random person, I know his name."

She sighs, "You're doing it again.."

"What?"

"Being retarted." Tibbetts looks away for a second thinking hardly. "Wait.. I am?"

"Yes, you do this every morning, something stupid."

"What'd I do?"

"Do I really have to tell you?"

Tibbetts looked blankly at the corner, "I don't know what I did."

"You do know, you're just being stupid again.." She turns away from Tibbetts and heads back into her own room.

Tibbetts paused for a moment, in confusion, then slowly walks into Julie's room. She was looking into a mirror, trying to spot any imperfections in her fur. Tibbetts spoke softly, "Hey, I'm sorry. You know I have trouble talking to others.."

"I really don't care, just leave me alone." Tibbetts looks down and turns away from Julie, not saying another word. Defeated, Tibbetts walks down the spiral staircase and out of the house. As he exits the house, he spots Lillie in the distance, walking towards his home. She gets stopped by a chubby Abyssinian guinea pig, who quickly leads her behind another home, out of sight of everyone.

She softly gets put against a wall, then gazed at the chubby pigs eyes. "Randy..." whispered Lillie. "What's wrong?"

"Nothin, just wanted to say hi." He starts groping on her, rubbing her fur softly.

She smiles, "Are you sure? You seem pretty curious right now."

"I am a pretty curious individual.." Randy continues to caress her, slowly placing his hands along her lower body.

He gets stopped short by Lillie, "We shouldn't do this here, if anybody finds us out we're finished." She peeks around to see if anybody's watching.

"Nobody can see us," said Randy.

Lillie looks back at Randy in concern, and murmured, "I'll come over in a few hours, okay?" Randy's expression turns to discontent. Lillie continues, "Can you wait till then? We can fuck all day if you want."

Randy hesitates, but agrees, "Okay.."

Lillie walks away into the open, indifferently. Randy watches her as she gains distance. She soon gets spotted by Julie, her best friend. Julie waves her down from the second floor of the house, "Hey, get in here!" Lillie smiles, and quickly walks into the home. Randy loses sight of her, and begins to make his way towards his home.

 _ **Meanwhile,**_

Ven is at the shack quickly grabbing a couple of rations of food. Getting rapidly annoyed with the people around, he decides to eat somewhere else. He takes some more food, and heads toward Alexei's home. Alexei's home stayed mostly the same over time. The tree next to the home was worn down over time from bullet holes and scratches. The home itself had small traces of mold on the exterior, but in general the house was up kept. Ven approaches the home, full of food in his arms, and spots the training course Alexei been working on for the past few days. Alexei was inside the home, and sees Ven through the window. The dark brown agouti guinea pig maintained his form over the years, with the exception of some gray hairs showing through his fur. Alexei's physical movement and strength have slown down, but his temper remains the same. He walks outside onto his front porch.

"Here.." exclaimed Ven. He lobs the cabbage bowl over to Alexei, he catches it. Alexei studies the food, and gets slightly disgruntled from the lack of variety.

He exhales through his nose heavily, "This shit again?" whispered Alexei to himself. He bites into a pellet, and cringes.

Ven walks up the porch steps, and looks over the training course. "You finished the course.." He then sits down onto a chair to begin eating.

"Fuck this!" shouted Alexei. He throws the bowl of food into the field next to the home. Ven shows no reaction, and just continues to eat on his chair looking at the course. "How do you eat this garbage?" ranted Alexei. "My sister can cook better than this shit!"

"Your sister?" asked Ven. "Where is she now?"

"Buried somewhere in Multa."

"How'd that happen?"

"Someone didn't like her cooking.. So they smacked her in the back of the head with a frying pan, then kicked a knife into her neck."

" _Kicked?_ "

"Yeah, once she was on the floor unconscious, they grabbed the chef knife and jabbed it into her neck. Once it settled in, they kicked it till it came out the front."

"A little much, where were you?"

"I was there, eating with everybody else."

"Did you do anything about it?"

"Nah, I was just a kid." Alexei snickers, "Although, they did make me clean up the mess and dump the body." Alexei turned his back on Ven and peered out into the distance and spots a guinea pig. The individual was separated from the village, and was lying in the grass. "Who's that?" wondered Alexei. Ven gets up and walks over next to Alexei, peeking around his shoulder.

Ven recognizes the fur pattern, "It's Tibbetts..."

"Autism boy? What the fuck is he doing now?"

"He's been doing that for the past few days. I think it's for him to 'cope' with himself."

"Cope with what? His fapping issues?"

"I don't really know.. Or care."

"Whatever."

Alexei and Ven return their attention to the course, and study it for a moment.

The course was broken down to three sections. The aerobic portion, the shooting portion, and the mixed shooting/aerobic portion. The aerobic portion consisted of a balancing ledge, some poles, a large wall, and a wooden tunnel. The balancing ledge was a small wooden plank being supported up by some more wood. The poles were slightly higher than the plank, and grew in tallness. There were four wooden poles in total, all jabbed into the ground. The wall was nearly two feet tall, and had a second wall, that was perpendicular to it. The tunnel, was essentially a Z shaped box, with nails hammered into it. Afterwards, was the shooting portion. It consisted of four wooden targets with a opening in the middle, leading to the tree. The final portion was at the tree itself. The tree had five more targets; three on the base of the tree, and two more on a branch high up on the tree, aimed down.

"You ready?" asked Alexei.

"How do I go about doing this?" responded Ven.

"Okay.. First, you're going to hop on the ledge, and balance your way across." Alexei points to the first portion of the course. "Once across, hop onto the poles and hop between them using only your hands. After that, do whatever it takes to hop over the wall, then quickly crawl under the nail tunnel. From there, take the Makarov, and hit all targets. Run through the opening, reload the weapon, and take out the targets at the base of the tree. There are targets in tree itself. Take them out, then run back to me to finish the course."

Alexei heads indoors and grabs his makarov, as well as a small watch that fits on his wrist. He walks back outdoors, regroups with Ven, and head towards the start of the course.

"Put this on," said Alexei.

He hands his holster to Ven without the pistol. Ven, without hesitation, wraps it around his waist and buckles it on. Alexei moves towards the shooting portion of the course, loads the gun, and puts it on a table near the targets. He then moves aside and begins to set up his watch. Alexei looks over towards Ven, and puts his hand on the watch. Ven looks back, then gets in the ready position.

"Ready!?" shouted Alexei from afar. Ven puts on a focused look, and prepares himself. "Get set! GO!"

Ven immediately sprints to full speed and approaches the balancing plank. Without slowing down, he hops in the air and smoothly lands on the plank. He continues to sprint on the plank, having no balancing issues. Ven quickly comes up to the poles, and dives into the air towards them. He uses the first pole as leverage to gain height for the second pole. On the second pole, he flips himself upside down and cartwheels to the third pole. Still upside down, he pushes himself higher to the last pole, grabbing it in perfect balance. Ven then flips off, doing a corkscrew, and lands perfectly. It was a solid landing that kicked up some grass.

Alexei saw this, smirked a bit, looked down at his watch to check the progress of time, "Eleven seconds!" he shouted.

Ven began to sprint again towards the next obstacle, and comes up to the large wall. The tall structure almost triples Ven in height. He spots the perpendicular wall, which is only slightly taller than him, and hops onto that instead. Using his feet, Ven kicks himself off the smaller wall high into the air. He reaches for the top of the taller wall, and barely grabs onto it, sliding off to the side a bit. This time, he uses upper arm strength to swiftly pull himself over. Ven then free falls back towards the ground, he rolls to compensate for the hard landing. The next obstacle was the nail box. Ven dives into the ground, crawling into the pointy box without fear. He crawls up into the corner and stops short, making sure he doesn't stab himself. He has to go around a corner, but can't turn his body to the left or right. Instead, Ven straightens out, and rolls to the left as if he was a pencil. This caused him to straighten himself out with the exit. Ven quickly waddles on the grass, finally escaping the barbed box. He picks himself up and sprints once more to the next portion of the course.

Alexei glances at his watch again, "Thirty seconds!"

Ven approaches the shooting portion, and spots the Makarov on the table. It had a magazine loaded, as well as a second mag next to it, both with eight rounds.

"Quickly!" shouted Alexei. "Empty the magazine on these targets!"

Ven swiftly grabs the pistol and fires four rounds, one onto each target. They were all headshots, he fires four more times, hitting all four targets again. The slide locks back, out of ammo.

"Reload!" screamed Alexei.

Ven uses his thumb to activate the mag release, and drops the spent magazine on the floor. He then rapidly takes the second mag from the holster and loads it into the gun, and releases the slide lock.

"Through the center! Forty-two seconds!"

Ven sets into a sprint once again, towards the final portion. He comes up to the tree and has to hop over a small wall. Behind it, three targets at the base of the tree. Ven swings over the wall, shooting the three targets in mid-swing. He then looks up and sees the last two targets directly above him. Getting a running start, Ven runs up the tree and kicks himself off, shooting the two targets in mid-air, while performing a backflip, and lands kneeling on the ground. He holsters the pistol, and does a final sprint back to Alexei.

Alexei clocks him as he passes by, "One minute, six seconds."

"Is that good?" asked Ven, slightly out of breath.

Alexei glances at the Makarov, and gestures to return it. Ven clears the weapon, and hands it over to Alexei. Alexei begins to refill the magazines up with ammo from the table next to him. Once finished, he cocks the weapon, and slams it on the table, sliding it over to Ven. "Not until its under a minute," firmly spoke Alexei. He points to the gun, "And you're carrying that throughout the whole course now. We're not stopping until I see better times."

Ven glances at the course, catching his breath. He takes a deep breath and turns towards the gun, and holsters it.

"Alright then," said Alexei. He resets his watch. "On your mark.." Ven quickly gets into position for another run. "Get set, go!"

Ven began to sprint once again to the start of the course. Alexei relaxes a bit and watches Ven quietly from the table, keeping a sharp eye on his watch. He suddenly looks over to the distance to see if Tibbetts is still there. The guinea pig was gone and nowhere to be seen. Alexei slowly scans the area to find him, with no luck. Alexei rolls his eyes, wondering why he even cared to look in the first place, then returns his attention to Ven.

But secretly, behind the building and out of Alexei's sight, Tibbetts is leaning up against the corner of the house peeking around, studying Ven. He sits there in excitement as he watches Ven train like its a movie. The jumps, the swiftness, and the shooting, all astonishes Tibbetts. Tibbetts grew a small liking to Ven, being that he is the only person that doesn't judge him directly.

Suddenly a shout is heard, "One minute, one second! Do it again!" Tibbetts retreats behind the wall a little, hoping not to get spotted. After a few moments, Ven was seen running again through the course and Tibbetts pops back out to watch. After a few more runs of the course Tibbetts began to yawn, and started to doze off watching Ven.

 _ **Later..**_

It's evening, the sun was beginning to set, and Ven is running through the course one last time. Total he did about 15 runs, as well as strength training, with small breaks in between. Ammo was running low, and Alexei was about to call it a day. Ven sprints pass Alexei, stops and breaths heavily, barely able to stand.

Alexei clocks the watch, and smiles, "Nice, Forty-three seconds." He turns to Ven, seeing him shaking and panting. "Looks like time for dinner," said Alexei.

With no hesitation, he turns around towards the house and begins to walk up the stairs. Ven slowly takes off the belt with the pistol still in it, lays it on the table, then follows Alexei indoors.

Suddenly Alexei stops at the entrance, spooked. "What's that sound?" thought Alexei to himself.

Ven stops at the staircase curious, "What's wro-"

Alexei interrupted Ven with a gesture to silence him. He begins to walk down the porch steps searching around for that sound. "Do you hear that?" asked Alexei. Ven perks his ears up and listens around. A subtle snoring is heard throughout the area.

"Snoring?" said Ven.

Alexei nods then continues to search around. Ven regains his posture and moves towards the pistol. He un holsters it and follows behind Alexei. They begin to search the perimeter around the house and soon spots a leg from around the corner towards the back of the house. Alexei shakes his head, then nonchalantly walks up to the sleeping individual.

Ven catches up and sees him. He shrugs, "Tibbetts.."

Alexei places his hand in the air in front of Ven, signaling to give him something. Ven looks at the makarov and hands it to Alexei. Alexei checks to see if there is a round in the chamber, and aims it to the ground in front of Tibbetts. He pulls the trigger.

The sound instantly wakes up Tibbetts in panic and pain, "FUCK!" shouted Tibbetts. He covers his ears in desperation hoping to clear the pain. Tibbetts sharply looks at Alexei and sees him, staring back at him with a gun in his hand. The pain was quickly overshadowed by fear. Tibbetts began to retreat a few inches away from Alexei. Alexei takes a step forward, continuing to aim the gun. "Alexei please!" trembled Tibbetts, the terror in his voice was noticeable.

"My house isn't a napping post." said Alexei.

"I-I'm sorry!"

"Why are you even here?"

"I was just watching Ven train." He spots Ven in the back spectating. "Ven! P-please can you tell him I mean no harm?"

"I can't help you." responded Ven.

Tibbetts turns up back to Alexei, and smiles in fear. Alexei glares at Tibbetts, and puts his finger on the trigger. Ven notices and looks at Alexei, wondering if he's going to actually pull the trigger. Ven's expression turns slightly concerned, but stands his ground. Tibbetts moved back a few more inches, "Alexei.. I-I'm sorry, please.."

"I don't take sympathy."

Alexei takes another step forward. Tibbetts' fear takes over and he gets up running away from Alexei as fast as he could, sprinting back towards the village. Alexei smiles and lets him run off. Ven begins to loosen up, tensioned from the conflict. Alexei turns to Ven, and snickers a bit. Ven grins slightly but shows some discontent.

"Cheer up," said Alexei.

He takes the magazine out of the pistol and ejects the round out of the chamber. The round flips in mid air, but is snatched by Alexei. He walks by Ven and hands him the pistol with the magazine and round.

"Clean that gun, then let's eat." Ven continues to gaze at Tibbetts as he ran away. "Ven!" shouted Alexei from the front of the home trying to get his attention. Ven sharply turns, gets his act together, and heads indoors.

It's late evening and Ven is on the couch, finishing up cleaning the gun. Alexei was almost finished cooking in the kitchen behind him.

"I'm curious.." said Ven. "Were you actually gonna shoot Tibbetts earlier?"

"Nah, he isn't worth dirtying my gun."

"I see."

"Also, why would I put an end to his suffering, and do him a favor?"

"Because you get off on it."

"Ha!.. I do."

Ven finalized the cleaning and re-assembles the gun. He loads a full magazine into the gun, and puts it in its holster. Alexei grabs some wooden plates and begins to serve some food with a glass of some liquid from a small barrel. There was a strong alchoholic scent coming from the barrel. Ven puts the holster on the table next to the couch and begins to eat. Him and Alexei enjoy food and talk about good times for the next few hours until bedtime.

* * *

 _ **Ven's all grown up!**_


	9. Clusterstorm

**WARNING! EXTREME GRAPHIC CONTENT!**

* * *

Chapter 9: Clusterstorm

The sun has fully set. Ven and Alexei just finished eating and were becoming sleepy. Alexei walks in from the backyard, dumping the extra food out. He sees Ven dozing off on the dining table. Alexei walks past him into his room, where he grabs a small blanket. He comes back and throws it at Ven. Ven wakes up and removes the blanket from his head.

"Sleep on the couch if you want," said Alexei.

He turns away from Ven, and heads back into his room. Ven struggles to get off the chair, still sore from the training earlier. He throws himself onto the couch along with the blanket and begins to rest. Soon the lights went out in the house, and Alexei falls asleep as well.

 ** _A few hours later_**

It's quiet, and peaceful in the village. Not a single sound is heard other than the crickets and the wind. Everyone in the neighborhood was asleep, no cars were passing by. The village itself was indifferent, all the guinea pigs were peacefully asleep. But suddenly, small noises are heard inside of the breeders home. The noises increase in volume, slowly. The sound of small ticks on the wooden floor, many of them. The lights turn on in the kitchen, and the shadow of the breeder is seen through the window of the house.

Suddenly she is attacked, her dog starts barking. The things attacking her were not human, but machines, stabbing her to death with their sharp extremities. She starts screeching wildly, but it soon subsides. Her dog continues to bark at the machines, and runs away. The machines quickly chase it down and put it out. The screaming and howling were heard throughout the village, waking many of the inhabitants. Some guinea pigs come outside curious, looking at the door to the breeders home.

Right when it starts to settle, the glass from the old lady's home shatters. Along with it, came out a toaster, with legs! The back door gets busted open, and a cluster of home appliances that came to life started flooding the village. Machines flying everywhere! Appliances destroying houses and killing its occupants. Everyone scatters in a panic, others remained in the houses hiding.

One house gets the roof ripped off by a coffee maker. The two occupants attempt to flee the home, but were unable. The coffee maker quickly shoots out its blade, slicing one of the guinea pigs in half. The guinea pig gurgles in blood, and attempts to talk unsuccessfully. The other turns to see his mate down on the ground, crawling with half a body. He attempts to return for his aid, but was stopped by a toaster and a blender. The guinea pig falls on his back in fear, looking at the menacing machines. His leg gets grabbed by the wires from the toaster, and tossed high into the air. As he falls, he is caught by the blender. The sharp mixing blade digs into his skin. The machine turns itself on in puree mode. The guinea pig splatters inside the blender, screaming in pain for only a second. His body mangled inside of the machine, turns into a pulp of meat.

Tyler looks out the window from his room, seeing the devastation. He first looks in the distance and sees his younger brother, Kelvin. He's being chased down by a couple of blue irons, throwing fireballs of cloth everywhere, catching the village on fire. One of the fireballs hit Kelvin, burning him alive and well as the area around him. He then looks down and sees his other brother Neal, surrounded by a waffle maker, and a mechanical razor. In no thought to save his brother, he jumps down on top of the waffle maker in order to distract them for him to flee.

"GO!" screamed Tyler.

Neal quickly scurries away from the area, but turns around to check on Tyler. Tyler gets knocked off by the waffle maker into the razor. His fur flies in the air, and he starts bleeding from his back. Neal seeing his brothers fate, turns back around in a attempt to save him, but it's too late. The razor began cutting into his skin, violently. Then the waffle maker attacks, chopping the guinea pig into mush with it's sharp teeth.

Neal stops short, and drops on his knees in despair. He looks right, and spots a microwave rushing towards him. It's crawling on four sharp legs, and has an mechanical eye coming out of its display. It hits Neal hard, sending him flying a few feet. He lands hard, sliding up against a house. The house door opens, it's Randy. Behind him was Lillie, fearing for life against the corner. The microwave rushes the home and quickly stabs Neal through the neck, and into the home. Wood debris flys everywhere, and Lillie screams. In a quick panic, Randy sprints underneath the microwave, abandoning Lillie in the house. He was quickly stopped by a floating radio, playing ratched music. It was red and had tentacles coming from the bottom. The tentacles surrounded Randy, picking him up off the floor. The microwave turns around and opens its door. The radio swiftly throws Randy in the microwave and the door shuts.

Lillie watches in shock as Randy panics inside the machine. The microwave beeps, and the inside starts smoking. Randy screeches profusely, then suddenly explodes in a bloody mess, intestines on the window of the microwave. The microwave turns it's attention over to Lillie, who is trembling in fear in the corner of the small home. It begans to rush the home once more. Out of options, Lillie snaps and attempts to flee as quick as she can out of the house. The front door wasn't viable, but she sees a window on the side of the house. She quickly gets out of the microwaves sight and dives out the window into the darkness.

The microwave begins to destroy the home, searching for Lillie without success. Lillie flees towards her home with tears running down her face. She turns around and sees the house crumble down. Lillie opens her eyes in shock and sprints even faster towards her home. She makes it inside, but the machine catches her in the corner of it's eye.

Inside the untouched home Lillie spots Elliot who's sitting at the center of the home.

"Lillie!?" screamed Elliot.

Lillie sprints over towards Elliot, hugging her tightly. "Mom! Terrible things.. T-The machines.. I-I'm scared." Lillie shakes in fear, but is slightly warmed by her mothers presence. "Where's Dad, and Ven?" asked Lillie.

"Ven is with Alexei. I sent Marlen there because its the safest place. I told him I would wait for you! Now C'mon, we need to get outta here!"

"How, with them out there!?" She points to their general direction.

"Follow m-"

Suddenly the rear of the home gets demolished. It's the microwave, returning for Lillie. Elliot gets trampled in debris from the home collapsing. Lillie gets caught in the debris and falls on the floor. The machine stares at her, opens its door, and drops the remains of Randy onto the grass next to the home. She turns to see the burnt and bloodied body, then returns her attention to the machine. It then raises a leg and impales her in the stomach. Lillie screams and coughs up blood. It twists its leg then releases her, searching for other victims. Lillie attempts to get up, but was weakened due to blood loss, and lies back down, looking at the village as it gets ravaged.

 _ **Meanwhile,**_

Ven wakes up abruptly to the sound of screaming in the village. He gets up and looks out the window. The whole village is in chaos and houses are on fire. Ven looks in awe, but is confused on exactly what's happening. He hears footsteps towards the front of the home, it's Alexei.

Alexei opens the front door and looks towards the village. "What the fuck's happening over there? I'm tryin to sleep.."

Ven looks a little closer and spots what looks like small, household appliances chasing around people.

"Are those.. fans?" spoke Alexei.

Suddenly, small ceiling fans converted in mini helicopters flew over Alexei's home around the neighborhood. As they pass over in the distance, Alexei looks down and spots a CD player coming towards them. It was green, and had two legs and four arms, each with a CD converted into a saw blade.

Ven spots the small machine, "This isn't good," he mumbles to himself.

"Uhh, fuck no!" shouted Alexei.

He sprints to the Makarov, and un holsters the gun. He returns out the front porch pre-aimed at the CD player. The machine spots Alexei, and pauses. All of a sudden, it converts back into a normal CD player and rolls itself towards Alexei. Alexei stands ground and waits for the machine to transform again. The CD player gets close to Alexei, and re-transforms into the saw blade mode, attacking with all four blades from up top like a hammer. Alexei quickly does a backflip, narrowly dodging the blades and shoots three rounds into the machine, shattering the CD's and shutting it down. Ven, inside the home wasted no time putting on the belt and holster.

He rushes onto the front porch, then down the steps, "Give it here!" shouts Ven. He points to the gun.

Alexei asks, "Where are you going!?"

"I have to check on my family."

"I'm surprised you actually care."

"Yeah, me too."

Alexei tosses the weapon towards Ven, "You loose my gun, I'll kill you myself."

Ven holsters the pistol and sprints on all fours towards the village. Meanwhile, Alexei walks up to the CD player, it's labeled, 'Saberling'. He kicks it, and the CD port opens. Inside, between the cracks, is something glowing. Alexei looks at it closer, curious on what it is.

Ten minutes have passed since the appliances came to life, and the entire village is in anarchy. Ven reaches the village from below the hill, out of the machines' sight. He comes up to his home, half of it destroyed. He glances around to see if any machines spot him. It's clear in this area of the village, most of them are ravaging the main part. Ven quickly scurries along side his home, trying to keep out of sight of the machines. He spots a burnt dead body next to the home. Ven attempts to identify who it is, with no luck. The body was just too bloody, almost no fur, and the face mangled with an eyeball hanging by a nerve. He disregards, and continues onwards to the front of his house.

Ven enters the home, it was empty and quiet, smells of dust and debris filled Ven's nose. The hallway was collapsed and there was no way of passing. The only entrance available was to Lillie's room. Ven walks around the house, every step creaking against the wood. He comes up to Lillie's room and enters. When he walks in, he sees Lillie on the floor, covered in dust and wheezing. Her right paw was dismembered from the body and was coughing up blood. Her stomach and lungs were punctured and were constantly oozing. She turns her eyes onto Ven, still alive. No words came out of her mouth, as she was in shock. Ven walked up to Lillie, kneeling beside her, her fate was nearing. It was too late to save her, and Ven knew it. As much as Ven wanted to put her out of her misery, he couldn't risk making too much noise. So he takes her hand, holding it tightly, and watches as her life vacates the real.

The last breath was drawn and Ven closes his eyes, releasing the hand. He looks out the window to check if any appliances were in the area. Suddenly, the debris behind him in the hallway shifts, and wood begins to fall over. Ven's turns his head questionably, and slowly reaches for his pistol. The debris shifts again. Ven pulls out his pistol, aiming at the debris. He slowly walks up to it, watching to see if any machines pop out. A few moments pass, then suddenly a hand pops out from the debris! Ven quickly aims at the hand, then realizes that's it not a machine. He holsters the gun and quickly attempts to remove the debris. As the debris clears, Ven gets a good view of the guinea pig inside. It's Elliot!

He quickly grabs her arm and pulls her out of the debris. Elliot screeches in pain as her body rubs against the sharp debris. As she gets pulled out, she falls onto Ven and they both fall on the ground. The debris shifts once more to fill the area Elliot was laying.

She coughs, then looks onto who saved her, "V-Ven?" Elliot attempts to get up, but fails. Her lower body was cut and bruised, legs broken, and unable to move. She lies on the ground, facing Ven. She struggles to talk, "You're okay.. Please tell me it's over.." Ven gets off the ground and turns to Elliot.

"Sadly, no."

"D-Did Marlen make it to you?"

"I haven't seen him, you and Lillie are the only two so far."

"Lillie?.. Is she okay? Where is she?"

Ven doesn't answer the question, but instead looks into the room where Lillie was, behind Elliot.

Elliot lays her head down in defeat, and looks into the distance. "Please.. don't let me turn around."

Ven grabs Elliot and drags her across the floor, away from the debris. He lays her up against the wall, sitting upright.

"Can you move your legs?" asked Ven.

"No.. I can't even feel them."

Ven turns and looks out the window once more to check and see if any appliances are heading their way.

"Why is it my family that always goes through the worst of consequences," said Elliot.

Ven turns towards her, "I think everyone is going through this, not just us."

She turns to Ven, "No, there was another time when something like this happened, you were really young."

"What do you mean?"

"I never told you this but, besides Lillie, you had two more siblings."

"Siblings?"

"Brothers... Your father and me, came from a pet shop. I gave birth to you, your sister, and two others."

"What happened to them?"

"Well on the night you were born, there was a fire in the pet shop. No one was there to put it out, so it destroyed everything, including the tank we were in. The fire came closer and me and Marlen were out of time, so we were forced to run with whoever we found first. We only escaped with two.."

"Wow.." Ven pauses for a second. "Did they have names?"

"Only one."

"Why not the other?"

"He was the runt, and Marlen said that we shouldn't name him so that we wouldn't get too attached."

"So you abandoned him?"

"I didn't want to abandon him, but..." She pauses, then sighs subtlety. "You know, you and the runt were twins."

Ven chuckles, "Yeah, that puts the topping on it.. My nameless dead twin brother. At least I know I had brothers, what was the other ones name?"

"Hurley."

"Hurley?"

"You're father named him. I think it was something about his old owner, or something about shirts.. Wait.. Marlen, where did he go?"

"Like I said earlier, I haven't seen him."

Elliot looks past Ven and wonders to herself, in despair. She looks down on the ground, knowing in the back of her mind she lost her spouse, and her daughter. Ven's the only one left in her family. She tumbles over to her side and closes her eyes. A small, singular tear is seen going down her face. Ven notices but doesn't interfere, his main focus is protecting the house.

Almost thirty minutes have passed since the beginning of the destruction. Ven, near the bottom right corner of the window, peeks around watching the village get destroyed. Luckily, almost all of the machines were focused in the center of the village near the main population, picking off guinea pigs and destroying homes. Almost half of the houses were either destroyed or on fire. Some of the appliances headed off into the streets to raid other homes, some stayed searching for victims. The appliances searched, home by home, killing whoever they found inside. One of the machines, a radio, looked towards Ven's side of the village, and began to hover its way over. Ven noticed, then readied his pistol, prepared to shoot.

The radio pulls up to the home, sticking its antenna inside, searching for occupants. It spots Elliot. Ven swiftly grabs the antenna and yanks it down, dropping the radio directly in front of the window. He sticks the makarov out, and shoots the machine twice. The radio screeches loudly, then drops to the floor, smoking. The other machines notice and turn towards Ven's home. Ven gets up and aims out the window prepared to use all of the ammo he has. The machines rush Ven's position, spotting him inside the home. Ven hops out the window and runs off to the side, diverting their attention away from his home as well as Elliot. Ven knows he can't take them all on, but does intend on taking as much of them out as possible. He stops short at the end of the village area, and turns around.

All of the machines were in the distance racing towards him. Prepared to make a final stand, Ven pulls the makarov, and aims toward the appliances. The closest appliance to Ven, a toaster, tripped on itself and fell over. The other machines stop and turn towards the toaster, looking at it curiously. Then suddenly, all of the appliances simultaneously fall on the ground, shutting themselves off.

Hell was over.

* * *

 **This is definitely the most gruesome chapter, so apologies for any troubles.**

 ** **Yup, this is the same clusterstorm as in the actual g-force film, where appliances came to life, and devastate humanity. Although in my book, they are way more deadly. Clusterstorm was active for about 30 minutes, or at least until Darwin stuck that infected PDA into the mainframe, shutting down the whole thing.****


	10. Loss

Chapter 10: Loss

Everything stopped, almost too quickly. In just a few seconds, havoc turned into peace. There was no sound, other than the wind and fire from the burning wood. Ven, still standing, continues to aim at the fallen appliance. He stares at it in angst for a few moments, trying to understand what just happened. After a few moments, his aggression subsides, and he holsters the pistol. Ven walks up to the motionless toaster, hesitating to get closer. In doubt, Ven kicks the machine to see if it will come back to life, nothing. He puts his arms around his waist and ponders. He looks around the village, eyes resting on his home. Suddenly, he realizes his mother was still in the house, struggling to sustain life. He rushes over to check on her. As he leaves the area, eyes are spotted in a house next to the toaster, looking at Ven as he passes by. As Ven passes more homes, more people peek out, wondering if the terror has ended. Ven approaches his house, half destroyed by the appliances, he walks in. Elliot is still against the wall, but unconscious. Ven slightly trembles, then goes to her aid, and checks for breathing. She's still breathing, subtlely; just unconscious. Ven sighs in relief. He sits down next to her, and recollects his thoughts on what happened.

Outside, the village was in almost total destruction. Of the almost thirty homes, only five of them stand untouched. Others were either on fire about to collapse, or just totally destroyed. Bodies of guinea pigs lay everywhere, some not even recognizable. The machines were included in the mix, dozens of appliances lay on the ground, motionless, scattered throughout the village, as well as the breeders neighborhood. The breeders home was suprisingly still intact. The interior was slighty ruffled, back door was knocked off its hinges, and the windows shattered. Other than that, the house remained livable.

Back inside the village, the guinea pigs slowly began to come out of hiding, one by one. Everyone looks around at the destruction, and some immediatly began searching for loved ones.

Behind the food shed, a guinea pig poked their head out, curious to see if it's all over. "Is it over?" asked a female voice. It was Julie, next to Tibbetts, sitting with her head face down in a upright fetal managed to avoid the machines by hiding out of sight.

"I-I don't know," responded Tibbetts. He was peaking around the corner, checking the area. "Everyone's coming out."

Julie looks up at Tibbetts, fearfully curious. She gets up, slowly coming up behind Tibbetts, and peaks around. Her expression changes, in almost instant regret. She looks upon the village, in awe from what happened. Her village destroyed, family destroyed, life destroyed.

"No.." said Julie softly, but desperately. She walks out aimlessly into the open.

Tibbetts reaches his arm out to her, "Julie wait.." She doesn't respond.

Tibbetts lowers his hand and looks around the village, trying to keep his cool. Suddenly he spots Ven, going into his home. Tibbetts sees half of it destroyed and wonders if he and his family are okay. Tibbetts looks back at Julie, who is still wandering almost drunkenly. He loses sight of her behind a burning house and re focuses his attention to Ven's home. Looking around to check if it's clear, Tibbetts quickly scurries along the sideline of the village making his way towards Ven's home.

Ven, still sitting next to his mother begins to hear noises nearby, he looks up out the window and sees most of the village members out and about. Uninterested, he sits back down with Elliot. Suddenly Tibbetts opens the front door to Ven's room and runs in. Ven quickly unholsters the pistol and aims at the guinea pig.

"Woah! Woah!" shouted Tibbetts. He puts his hands between him and the gun, cowarding back.

"Tibbetts?" responded Ven. Ven puts the gun away and gets up. "What are you doing here?"

Tibbetts slowly lowers his arms, "I-I wanted to check on you, a-and your family... Are they alright?"

"Well, you're looking at who's left."

Tibbetts peeks over Ven and spots Elliot, unconscious. "Just you two?" Tibbetts quickly steps around Ven towards Elliot, and kneels beside her. He checks for breathing.

"She's still alive," spoke Ven. "She's just resting."

"Well you're definately right about her being alive, but.." Tibbetts moves the body around, and hears a crackling from her back. "That's not good.."

"What?"

"Her back... It's broken." Ven doesn't respond, but moves closer interested. "Yeah, her back is broken in the lumbar vertebrae. The uh.. lower back, right here. Tibbetts points out to Ven the location of the bone. "That bone takes a long time to heal, if at all. It's in the spinal cord which carries the nerves from the brain to the lower part of the body." Ven re focuses his attention to Tibbetts, suprised to see the knowledge coming out. Tibbetts continues, "Her legs are also broken." He moves towards her upper body, "Her arms are fine.. But.." He feels a crick in her neck. "Her cervical vertabrae is sprained, but not broken."

"What does that mean?" asked Ven.

"Her neck is cracked... She's for the most part paralyzed from the waist down. Here, let's put her flat on the ground, and keep her head straight up." They both move her down on the wooden floor, lying face up.

Ven turns towards Tibbetts, "Where did you learn all of this?"

"Well, I used to sneak into the lady's home, and read books."

"Like medical books?"

"There was one of those, yeah... Is there anyone else here?"

"Alive? No.."

"Why'd you say alive?"

Ven turns his head to the room Lillie was in, Tibbetts follows. He curiously gets up and slowly walks to the room peeking around the corner. "Ughh.." He sees the bloody mess, and a dead corpse. He looks at her for a few moments then turns away, looking out the window. Almost everyone came out from hiding, Tibbetts sees an opportunity to help out everyone else.

"Hey," said Tibbetts. "I'll be right back." He rushes out the front door towards the main part of the village.

One of the untouched homes, was the doctors house. The doctor of the village was chosen by the community to care for everyone's health and well-being. They are chosen based on experience and knowledge of caretaking. They are also chosen to handle birth's, and usually have a good amount of medical supplies. These medical supplies are usually stored in the food shed, but the village decided that it would be better if it was readily accessable inside someone's home. It's a big responsibility that puts a lot of stress on the guinea pig, but a rewarding job.

As Tibbetts runs out the door, he sees the village's remaining guinea pig gather towards the doc's house, looking for help. There's almost thirty pigs near his front door, doing what looks like searching around. Tibbetts runs into the crowd and overhears a few pigs in the front near the door.

"Where is he?" said one pig.

"I just said, I don't know," answered another. Everyone was trying to talk over one another, and was causing a some sort of chaos.

"Well, has anyone seen Tyler!" shouted a pig from one corner.

"He's dead!" shouted another.

"What about Neal!?" Another guinea voice came out.

"I saw half of him next to one of the burning homes!" The whole village was asking for the doc.

Suddenly one shouted, "Here! Here! I found him." Tibbetts turned as well as everyone else. One guinea pig covered in dirt was seen dragging another pig.

Some went to his aid, "It is the doc!"

"Is he okay!?"

"He's dead!"

"Don't say that, maybe he's unconscious!" Everyone was squabbling in anarchy.

Tibbetts hurried himself towards the small crowd handling the doc and kneeled down beside him, "Lemme take a look!" shouted Tibbetts. They stop and look at Tibbetts, then at each other, in confusion. Tibbetts studies the body for a moment, then concludes, "Um.. Yeah, he's de-"

Without warning, Tibbetts gets shoved aside by another guinea pig. "Move kid, this is no time for games!"

It was an almost siamese guinea pig. Named Ellis, he has cream colored fur, with a touch of brown fading from the nose back. Ellis takes over diagnosing and shoves Tibbetts aside. Tibbetts gets up slowly and looks back at the small group, already forgetting him and paying no mind.

"Sorry guys, he's gone.." said Ellis.

Everyone looks down quietly. Tibbetts gets on his feet, and prepares to say something but stops himself, retreating back to the crowd.

"Now what?" asked one of the pigs next to Ellis.

"Well.. Let's gather the bodies, get a count and see if anyone needs help."

Tibbetts rolled his eyes thinking to himself, "As if that wasn't obvious enough."

Everyone began to scatter around the village, collecting bodies. Some couldn't handle the pressure of cleaning up their loved one's remains, so they stayed inside the doc's home. After a few minutes of laboring, one guinea pig was found trapped inside his home, under debris. Ellis and some others came by to help get him out. Tibbetts saw the trapped guinea pig, and decided to come help as well. The guinea pig was laying down trapped from the chest down surrounded by blood, and unable to move. Ellis comes up to the pig and points at one of the helpers to grab his arms.

"We'll pull together," said Ellis. The other pig nods in agreement and they prepare to pull.

Tibbetts watches from the side and notices something, "The wood is impaled into his stomach!" thought Tibbetts. "If they pull him out from the debris, it will rip his insides and kill him."

Tibbetts began to rush his position and shout saying stop, but it's too late. They pull the body out and the victim begins to bleed violently. Ellis and his helper attempt to control the gushing, but the victim bleeds out within seconds giving his last breath. Tibbetts stops short and looks down in failure. Afraid to say anything, he turns around and tries to help elsewhere.

Suddenly, a guinea pig shouts from the distance, "Can I get some help over here!?"

Tibbetts turns and rushes to their aid. He arrives with two other guinea pigs. They are at the edge of the village looking down into the valley, a body had fallen down it. Tibbetts was the first to come down the steep incline, followed by the two others. When he gets there, Tibbetts attempts to identify the body. It was an abyssinian guinea pig, sort of plump. Tibbetts is in shock when he turns to look at the face; It's Marlen!

"Marlen!?" shouted Tibbetts. "What was he doing down here?"

"Probably trying to run away but got caught," answered one of the pigs. The two others arrive and begin lifting him up, taking him up the hill.

Tibbetts stands aside and murmers to himself, "Aw man, what's Ven gonna think about this.. I have to tell him."

"Thanks for helping!" suddenly shouted one of the guinea pigs sarcastically towards Tibbetts.

Tibbetts realized he was just standing there the whole time and apologizes. As they get out of sight, Tibbetts turns to Ven's home and decides to check up on him, telling the news. He climbs back up the hill, and is stopped short by a conversation between the villagers. It was with Ellis and a couple of villagers.

"So, who's gonna take over the village?" asked a villager.

Ellis responds, "I think Julie should take over, she the last competent person alive in her family."

"Where is she?"

"In the doc's home, recovering from this mess."

"Speaking of the doc, what about him? Who's gonna take his position?"

"I can do it.." said Ellis. "I assisted Alec in multiple occasions."

Alec was the old doc of the village. He was an old guinea pig, but was one of the smartest. Everyone loved him as he was sweet and had a gentle personality. But not anymore.

"Are you sure you're up to it?" asked a villager. "There's uhh, a lot of people in that house right now."

"Well.. Now it's my house so..-"

"NO!" shouted Tibbetts from the distance. The others turn as he moves closer. "No, NO! You are not taking that house!"

"You don't have a say in this," responded Ellis.

"Yes I do. According to you, Julie is taking over right? Being her brother, I take second in charge."

"Sorry but it doesn't work that way, it's by popular vote."

"And everyone already voted her as leader? And you as doctor?"

"Pretty much."

"No! I will not stand for that bullshit. Prove it!"

"Why? Do you wanna be the leader of the village?"

"No, but-"

"Okay then, shut up and go away."

"I wanna be the doctor..."

Ellis stops short and chuckles, "You? Ha!"

"I'm serious."

"Do you even know anything about doctoring?"

"I know a lot about medical treatment, way more than you!"

"No you don't, you didn't even help one person today."

"Because everyone was shoving me aside."

"Oh, that's just because you suck."

"...Prove that you got voted as doctor."

"You really want me too?"

"Yes."

The doctor pauses, then waives his arms in the air. "Hey everyone! Attention!" The village pauses their work and listens in. "Tibbetts here wants to become the village doctor, as opposed to me!" Everyone gives a confused look, some giving dirty looks at Tibbetts. "Who here wants to vote for Tibbetts as doctor?" Absolutely no one raises their hand. "Anybody for me?"

Slowly hands begin to raise up, one by one. Each hand brought a bigger smile to Ellis's face.

He turns to Tibbetts, "You see?"

Tibbetts looks up knowing in the back of his mind, they made a bad decision. "That's not even fair," hollered Tibbetts. "You didn't even let me prove myself."

"You don't have to prove yourself, I already know what the people want."

"Yeah, but you don't know what they _need_."

"I do know, me."

"Okay motherfucker.." Tibbetts balls his fist in pure anger. "Screw y-"

All of a sudden, a siren is heard in the distance, it's sound echoing throughout the neighborhood and village. It spooks everyone, causing guinea pigs to pile up inside homes trying to take shelter. Bright flashing lights illuminate the neighborhood. Tibbetts scurries in the opposite direction, heading towards Ven's home. He rushes inside. Ven doesn't hesitate to invite Tibbetts inside, he slams the door shut.

Tibbetts walks up to Ven looking out the window. "What is it?" asked Tibbetts.

"It's a firetruck, or ambulance," answered Ven.

"I've heard of those, it's like human doctors right?"

"It's a vehicle, that carries.. human doctors.. just stay here."

The vehicles park in front of the breeders home. Large footsteps are heard in front of the home, then banging on the front door. After no answer, they bust the door down, searching for any survivors.

"We found one!" said one firefighter.

"Fire!" said another one. "In the backyard!"

They quickly gather a fire extinguisher from the truck, and put out the small fires in the backyard. Meanwhile, the ambulance personnel grab a stretcher and take the old lady, as well as her dog.

One of the firefighters stand near the shattered back door, looking at the village. "Why is there a bunch of model homes in the back?"

"Who knows," answered another firemen. "Maybe it was the lady's hobby. C'mon we have a job to do."

The firefighters quickly clear out the home and head into their vehicles moving house to house, checking if anyone needs help.

Back at Ven's home, he listens to the vehicles as they drive further away, lights getting dimmer and siren fading. Since the fires were extinguished, the village was now really dark, only being lit by the moon. Tibbetts was tending to Elliot, still resting from her incident earlier. And Ven was sitting up against the wall near the window, examining the makarov.

Tibbetts turns to Ven, "Hey, just wanted to let you know, I found your father."

"I'm assuming he's dead."

"Uh.. yes."

"I'm not even surprised anymore.." He continues to study the pistol and realizes what Alexei had said about it. He looks out the window into the distance towards Alexei's home. "I need to go."

"Where?" asked Tibbetts.

"Back to Alexei. Stay here if you want, I need to make sure he's okay."

"That's fine, rather stay away from other people anyway.." Ven holsters the pistol, and hops out the window, traveling towards Alexei.


	11. Enemies Lead Towards Enemies

Chapter 10: Enemies lead towards enemies

 ** _At Alexei's house_**

Ven arrives at the wooden home, untouched from the machines. He looks in front of the house and sees the CD player, still shattered on the floor, but no Alexei. He pans around the area to find him and begins to worry. Suddenly, the russian pig appears in front of the porch, carrying what appears to be a hammer. Ven's expression showed relief that his friend was not harmed during this disaster. Alexei approaches the CD player, and turns to Ven.

"About time," said the dark brown guinea pig. His voice filled with dismay,"You have my gun?" Ven gestures at the pouch and unbuckles the belt. "Good, you've done well."

Ven puts the belt onto the table in front of the course, and returns to Alexei, "What are you up to?" asked Ven.

"You'll see."

Alexei begins to hammer the machine, prying off the pieces as he goes along. Ven walks up next to Alexei, curious on what he's gathering on about. Ven studies the machine and sees a bright blue light glowing around the area Alexei was hammering at. Ven squints to get a better look, but can't make out what it is.

"Grab a hammer and help me break this," barked Alexei. Alexei hands Ven a second hammer that Alexei had brung out. The two begin to hammer away at the broken CD player. After a few good hits, the item in question begins to show itself, and appears to be a chip. It was gray in appearance, but had a blue tint from the electricity flowing in it. It had the word 'Saberling' marked on it, and a timer that read '00:00:00'.

"A computer chip?" asked Ven.

"Not just any chip," said Alexei. "I've seen this technology before." Alexei reaches into the machine and plucks the chip out of it. Ven silently watches and listens. "It's a receiver.. Military grade." Alexei studies the chip in even further detail, "Yeah.. We have these back home, they're designed to be put on unmanned drones or weapons."

Ven looks at the small timer at the top, "It has a clock."

"A timer.. Probably to tell the machines when to activate." Alexei looks in the distance to the village. "This chip is probably in all of the machines."

"Any idea why?" asked Ven.

"Nope... But.." Alexei thought for a moment, then came up with an idea. "If it's a transceiver, then whatever sent the signal out, can send it back."

"It's trackable..."

"Yes. But better yet, it's possible to back track where the signal was sent sent from." He turns to look at Ven. "We can find out who did all of this."

"How are you gonna figure that out?"

Alexei puts down the chip and begins to walk back inside his home, Ven follows. Alexei walks into his room, turning on the battery powered lamp and shoves the bed aside. Underneath it was a compartment, concealed by the wood floor. Alexei digs his finger on the sides and lifts the wood up revealing the contents. Inside was a plethora of gear, given to Alexei from russia. Included were some binoculars, a knife, satellite radio, a regular AM/FM radio, a handheld PDA, a vest, some general tools, and a IRP (Individualnovo Ratsiona Pitanee - The russian version of an MRE). There was a slot for a weapon and some ammo, but it was empty. Next to the case were a pair of keys, one that looks like it goes to a vehicle.

"This is... interesting," said Ven. "I've never seen this."

Alexei picks up the PDA and the satellite radio, "All this gear was given to me for my mission in America, but I had no use for it, until now."

"What's with the keys?"

"Don't worry about it. Come.."

Alexei walks back out his room gesturing Ven to follow. Ven knows in the back of his mind, they're for something important. Ven begins to walk out of the room, eyes fixed on the keys as he leaves. As he walks outdoors, he spots Alexei hooking up the chip to the PDA, using an adapter. He kneels down, blows the dust off the PDA, and powers it on. Ven walks up behind Alexei, and looks at the screen of the PDA. It reads in russian, but at the top was labeled, "S.O.A.D".

"You know, I remember you telling me that you came from russia, and that you used to be a spy," remarked Ven. "But you never told me who you worked for exactly."

Alexei paused then continued hooking up the PDA, "It's not worth telling who I work for.. Use to work for.. Because you already know."

"SOAD." Ven read the text on the PDA.

"Yup, Special Operations Animal Division." Alexei successfully hooks up the machine and attempts to see if the PDA recognizes the chip.

"Was your job a tech specialist?" asked Ven.

"Intelligence. My job was to infiltrate highly secure area's and gather information."

The PDA beeps, signaling that it recognizes the chip. Alexei peers into the screen, going through the info. Ven attempts to read it, but can't understand the language.

"I was right," said Alexei. "These specs match the database.. The chip is used in the unmanned US military weapons program."

"So the country attacked itself..."

"Seems like it."

"That doesn't make any sense. Who would use their own weapons to hurt themselves?"

Alexei thought for a moment, "Maybe it wasn't the government itself, hold on."

Alexei digs into the files of the chip, and attempts to get the ip address. The chip locks him out, asking for an admin password.

"Shit," spurted Alexei. "Of course the files are password protected."

"You can't get in?"

"No I can."

Alexei stands up taking the PDA and the chip indoors. Ven grabs the radio, as well as the holster, and follows. Inside, Alexei sets the chip and PDA on top of the workbench, then heads around the corner to his room. Ven sets the radio down next to the workbench, places the holster onto the table, and falls onto the couch, exhausted from the events earlier. Alexei re-appears around the corner, with another device in his hand, waiving it in the air.

"This baby will get us in," shouted Alexei.

"What is it?" asked Ven.

"It's a code breaker. Designed to break passwords."

"I'm pretty sure your primary job was hacking."

"Nah.. I can do it, but it's not my job. That position belonged to one of my-"

He suddenly stopped short, as if something had hit him emotionally. Ven intervened, "One of your..?"

"Teammates.. A comrade."

Alexei trembled, but shrugs it off, continuing to work on the PDA. Ven felt the pain in his voice and decides to change the subject.

"So, how does that thing work?" asked Ven.

"I-It's generates random code based off probability."

"Sounds complex, does it take long?"

"Depends on how advanced the code is on the chip." Alexei lectured. "Could take a few minutes, could take all night. I have to mess around with the settings to get the best chance."

"Hmm.."

Ven leans back and begins to rest on the couch as Alexei continues the decoding.

 ** _Back at Ven's Home_**

Tibbetts is sitting up against the wall tending to Elliot, awaiting for her to wake up. He was dozing off, about to fully pass out. Suddenly, and abruptly, the front door blasts open, shattering in pieces. Tibbetts sharply gets up and retreats behind Elliot. A blender tries to fit inside, but can't. Instead, It busts down the wall, collapsing that half of the house. Tibbetts doesn't say a word and is in pure shock. The red blender turns around and looks at Elliot and Tibbetts. It raises one of it's legs and swings at Elliot. The sharp blade pierces through her neck and blood splatters everywhere. Tibbetts retreats even further up against the wall. The machine lifts the arms and swiftly attacks Tibbetts. The sharp blade is the last thing Tibbetts sees before it begins to cut into Tibbetts' chest. Tibbetts shrieks widly in panic-

A loud knock on the door. Tibbetts awakes, dazed and disrupted from a nightmare. The door opens, and Tibbetts turns to see who it is. It was Ellis, the newly chosen doctor. Along with him, some people to assist him.

"Tibbetts.. I was wondering where you where at," said Ellis.

Tibbetts trembles for a sec, trying to shake off the nightmare. "W-what do you want?"

"I'm getting accountability for everyone, and gathering the wounded." Ellis shifted his eyes over next to Tibbetts and sees another guinea pig, lying flat on the ground. "Who's that?" asked Ellis.

"That's Elliot.. Ven's mother."

"And you're just in here with her.."

"I'm taking care of her, she's paralyzed from the chest down."

"How do you know that?"

Tibbetts sneered, "It's a secret, I'm not gonna tell the pretend doctor, fuck that guy."

"Yeah, your real fucking funny you know that?"

"Oh, I'm hilarious."

Ellis kneels down next to Tibbetts, and speaks to him softly, "You know, if there wasn't a group of people behind me right now, I would fucking beat the shit out of you."

"Do it, you won't.."

"Did you not just hear what I said-"

"NO BALLS!"

Ellis stands back up, "I don't have time for this shit, leave this house!"

"Make me."

Ellis glares at Tibbetts, then gestures to the group next to him. They obey and approach Tibbetts, about to pick him up. Tibbetts places his hand in front of guinea pigs, and stands up under his own power. He sighs, then points at Ellis.

"Leave her be.. She really is paralyzed." Tibbetts continues. "Make sure she lies straight like she is now, otherwise, you could kill her. And I swear if you do.."

"My job is to save people.. Why would I kill her?"

"You seem to have a lack of knowledge."

"Believe what you want to believe.. She'll be fine."

"She better be fine, or else."

"What are you gonna do about it?"

"Not me, Ven."

"Pfft, I don't even think Ven cares about his family. He's not even here... Anyway you're wasting my time, please."

Tibbetts raises his arms, "Where am I gonna go?"

"Home.. You're house isn't damaged."

"Wait, really?"

Tibbetts heads to the window and searches for his home. He spots it, sure enough, in perfect condition. In awe, he exits the home. Almost immediatly the door behind him slams. Confused, Tibbetts walks over to the side of the home, and looks in through the window.

"You know there's a window here, right?" said Tibbetts towards Ellis.

"GO!" shouted Ellis, seeming very annoyed at this point.

Tibbetts smiles and turns his back, walking towards his home.

 ** _The Next Morning, Alexei's home_**

Everyone was asleep in the Alexei residence. Ven had blacked out on the couch from exhaustion, and Alexei fell asleep on the workbench. The PDA was still on, asking for a password. The morning sunshine, was exceedingly bright, and lit the interior with brilliance. It was peaceful, until suddenly a knock came from the front door. Ven instantly awoke and peered over to the front of the leaving room, eyes bloodshot from sleeping. He sits upright, groggy from bad sleep. The door knocks again. Ven wonders who it could be and looks over to Alexei, who is beginning to wake up. Ven grabs the pistol from the table and slowly walks to the front door. He opens it halfway, with the pistol concealed behind his back. It was Tibbetts!

"What? Why are you here?" said Ven leaning on the door.

"Uh, there's something I wanna show you," responded Tibbetts.

Alexei, finally awake, overhears in the back. "Who is it?" said the russian pig. "Is it those bitches from a couple nights ago? Oh wait, they're probably dead..."

"It's Tibbetts."

"That's even worse!"

"I wanted to show you guys something," remarked Tibbetts.

Alexei continues to ramble from around the corner of the house, "Like what.. Did you finally find your penis?"

"Seriously.."

"I am serious, did you manage to find it?"

Tibbetts murmured, "I definitely found something..."

"Is it your penis?"

Tibbetts sighs, "It involves last night!"

Ven interrupts, "What about last night?"

"It's on the TV.. T-the news channel. Something you might wanna check out."

"What's on it?"

Tibbetts glared at Ven for a few seconds, "Yourself.."

Ven's expression turned questionable, and curious. He looks over to Alexei, who came from around the corner.

"Follow me," said Tibbetts.


	12. News

Chapter 12: News

The three guinea pigs are passing through the village, looking at the wreckage. It had looked so much worse now that it was morning. It was quiet and no one was around, except for the machines, still on the ground lifeless. Tibbetts, Ven, and Alexei approach the shattered back door of the breeders home and look inside. There were voices coming from inside the home. Curious, they roam inside, trying to avoid the pieces of wood all over the floor. They look around, studying the home. Blood was on the wall and floor near the hallway leading to the bedrooms. Electricity ran through the house, lights were on in the kitchen and living room. The view was distracting to Tibbetts but gets overshadowed by the sound of voices, coming from the kitchen of the house. The kitchen was essentially the first thing you see when you come in from the back door. It was a U-shaped kitchen with the fridge on the right side against the wall. The center side of the kitchen had the sink, up against a window, viewing the front of the house. The left side had a old CRT television set sitting on it. It was tuned to a news channel, which is on commercial at the moment. A table was set up near the TV and had a broom laying on the side, leading to the top of the table. Guinea pigs flooded the table, almost to the edge, tring to watch the TV.

"Up here," guided Tibbetts.

Alexei and Ven follow up the broom to the top. It seemed that a dispute was taking place. Everyone was arguing about the future of the village.

"Everyone stop bickering!" shouted a guinea pig near the front.

"I'll stop after I get some fresh food, who gonna provide that!?" shouted another pig.

"Better yet, who's gonna watch over us!? We're all stranded here!"

"Okay I know," said that same guinea pig up front. "We will all be fine, if we work together."

Another pig inturrupted, "We can't work together if we get seperated! How long do you think it'll be until animal control comes here and takes us all! Back to the humans? Hell no!"

"This is all Ven's fault!" shouted a female guinea pig from the right.

Ven sharply turned, confused on what's even happening.

"We don't know if it's Ven, stop blaming him!" said the guinea pig up front.

"You saw the same thing we did, where was he anyway? I didn't see him last night!"

Ven doesn't say a word, but turns to Alexei, who's just as confused.

They continue, "He was probably at that russian fuckers house."

Alexei lashed out, "Ay who the fuck are you!?"

Almost immediatly, everyone shuts up and turns around, spotting Ven and Alexei.

"Ven.." said the guinea up front once again. It was an older guinea pig, named Hugo, a dark silver agouti. Next to him was Julie. Hugo was the new lead guinea pig of the village. He was appointed by Julie.

"What's going on here?" said Ven.

"We're having a meeting."

"Sounds more like a riot."

Another person lashes out, a dark orange a black guinea pig. "For good reason! Where were you last night?"

"I was here."

"At Alexei's!?"

"Yes, but also in the village."

"I didn't see you, and neither anyone else."

"I saw him!" shouted Tibbetts.

"Shut the fuck up Tibbetts no one cares about your opinion!"

Everyone gets worked up again, "Woah, calm down!" shouted Hugo up front.

Suddenly, the news network comes back on.

"It's back on!" shouted a random pig. "Let Ven see!"

Everyone shuts up and listens in including Ven and Alexei.

"Welcome back," hollared the news network. "For those of you just tuning in, the state of California is still under lockdown since the catastrophe of "Sabersense" took place. Many more reports of injuries are coming in since last night. The death toll has risen to over 1000 throughout the state of California, and more throughout the country. The CEO of Saberling appliances, Leanord Saber, is being held for questioning, and seemed to be a victim himself. Saying he has nothing to do with it, and was not involved with the sudden transformation of his appliances. More to come on that."

"This was a global event.." whispered Ven to Alexei.

The news network continued, "If none of you saw it yet, here is the video, captured by a bystander at Leanord Sabers mansion. This was last night. The FBI are on the scene, then suddenly, a massive machine emerging from the ground up. If you look closely at the top, you can see what looks like, and you might laugh, a guinea pig and a mole at the top! The FBI are denying any questions about the rodents and why they were there."

The amatuer footage was suprisingly clear, and the camera zoomed in on the machine. It had to be at least 75 feet high, and was made up of a bunch of different appliances combined together. The top of the machine had a small area, and you could clearly see the guinea pig that was up there. It was brown with white fur coming from the belly up over towards the eyebrows just like Ven's.

"What the.." said Ven. "No way.. That's not me."

Alexei, baffled, just looks at Ven, speachless.

"How is that _not_ you?" said the orange and black guinea pig. He raises his voice to get the attention of the crowd, "Hey everyone! How many guinea pigs do you know, that are able to do the things Ven can do?"

No one answers.

"I'm telling you that's not me," Ven raised his voice slightly. "I was here, defending the village."

"With all the shit you and Alexei do, I have a hard time believing that."

"Don't worry Ven," said Hugo. "We're not accusing you."

"This sounds very much like your accusing me."

The dark orange pig continued, "Who was the mole!?"

"I honestly have no clue." said Ven.

"You're playing stupid, I kno-"

Hugo interrupts, "Stop accusing Ven! It's pretty clear he also doesn't know what's going on."

"No!" shouted the orange pig. "He's the only one here capable of doing such a thing!"

The crowd gets anxious, and riled up. It starts getting out of hand getting out of hand. Many trying to work together, many trying to fight, Hugo couldn't control the crowd. Alexei, getting frustrated, unholsters his pistol. He aims it up to the roof and fires twice, dust from the roof comes floating down and everyone is in silence.

"We will figure out who did this to the village," bellowed Alexei, waving around the makarov. "And we will bring revenge.." He looks around. "Ven, did not do this. He was not involved in the unforeseen events of which was last night, I can assure you.. Anyone who thinks otherwise, can test their knowledge against me and a bullet." Alexei points the gun at the crowd, "Anyone?.. Good."

The black and orange guinea stands up, "I challenge that because I know your involved too!" He walks closer, "Fucking russian, trying to destroy this village-"

Blood mists in the air, and the guinea falls to the ground, bullet hole in the forehead.

Alexei criticizes, "I'm actually very faithful to this place, it has given me a lot."

"Alexei, what the hell!" shouted Hugo.

"What? I fucking warned him. Look, now that's just one pig you don't have to feed anymore."

"No! Don't come here and bring that violence, we've dealt with enough! Just.. leave."

"Fine." Alexei holsters the pistol, "I'm still true to my word. We _will_ find out who they are , and get revenge." He turns to Ven, "I'll see you back at the house."

Ven doesn't answer, but gestures in agreement. Alexei gets onto the broom and slides back down, exiting the house. Meanwhile the group of guinea pigs remain on the table tending to the guinea pig shot, and disputing on what will happen.

Tibbetts ganders at Ven, "You're mother's awake now."

"She's okay?"

"Yeah, she woke up earlier this morning wondering where you were. She's not here though."

"At my house right? Cause she's paralyzed.."

"Correct."

Ven looks around to see if anyone is watching. Everyone is mostly focused on the one guinea pig who was shot. Without parting ways, he swiftly exits the scene without being spotted. Tibbetts watches, then blends in with the crowd, curious of the dead body. He wonders if he could ask Alexei to shoot the doctor, Ellis, so that he would become the main doctor.

 ** _At Ven's home_**

Ven stands outside his half home, looking at it with distress. He walks in to see that the interior has been re-done. There was a piece of cloth near the window, being used as cot. Elliot was on the cot resting.

"She looks a lot better," thought Ven to himself. He really feels for her, being that she just lost her whole family in a matter of thirty minutes. A small makeshift table was next to her. On it, was a tray, full of food for her. The floor squeeks when Ven approaches her. She attempts to get up, but can't. She's only able to turn her head.

"Who's there?" asked Elliot.

Ven walks up besides her, "It's me."

"Ven.. You're alive."

"I would hope so.."

"How's Alexei?"

"He's fine." Ven peeks over to the room Lillie was in, the body had been removed.

"So is it true?" asked Elliot.

"What?"

"Was it you and Alexei that caused all of this?"

"...Did they tell you?"

"They told me enough."

"You know, we just went through a drama involving them.. But no, I can promise you we didn't turn every appliance in the world into a killing machine."

"The world?" wondered Elliot.

"Yes, apparentely this was a global event."

"I see, figured as much.. I knew you wouldn't do such a thing."

Ven smiled, "Me and Alexei are gonna find out who did this."

"That's the other thing.. Who was the guinea pig they saw?"

"That's the best part of the story, it was someone on the news channel who looked like me, almost exactly like me."

"You saw it?"

"Yeah, it's wierd, but they were right on one thing. Whoever that guinea pig is, most likely knows the most about this..."

Ven looks as if he's out of time, eager to head to Alexei's and figure out the mystery.

"I have to go," said Ven.

"Already?"

"I'm sorry."

"Well I can't stop you."

Ven turns and smiles, then exits the home, "I'll keep you updated." He scurries off heading back towards Alexei's.

* * *

 **The news channel is basically the scene from the first g-force when Darwin and his team were fighting clusterstorm, and facing Speckles**


	13. Search n' Lose

Chapter 13: Search n' Lose

 ** _Alexei's house_**

By the workbench, Alexei was on his chair, trying to break the password to the chip's files. He's beginning to get frustrated, because the PDA was failing to get a correct password. Ven walks in, curious to know if any progress has been made.

"Anything?" questioned Ven.

The computer beeps on an incorrect password.

"Ugh!" barked Alexei.

He tosses the PDA against the wall in frustration. Ven walks past Alexei, and silently sits on the couch, gazing at the wall. Alexei turns and sees Ven, contemplating something.

"You're thinking about that pig, huh?" said Alexei.

"It's just.." responded Ven. "It seems wierd that he looks just like me."

"A lot of guinea pigs look like one another, Ven."

"But this is too big of a coincidence.. Why was a guinea pig and a mole on top of a massive machine in the first place?"

"Who knows.. If anyone does, they do."

"If we can find them."

"We will." Alexei looks over and picks up the PDA once more. He begins to generate another password for the chip. "I promise we'll get revenge for this."

"I'm surprised you actually care."

"Do you not? They killed your family."

"I do." Ven pauses for a moment, "But why do _you_ care?"

"I look out for my comrades."

Ven, surprised to hear such cordial words, says no more and leans back against the couch looking out the window.

 ** _A few hours later_**

The sun was beginning to drop, and Alexei continued to generate passwords for the chip. He was leaning on the table, head on his hand, and seemed incredibly bored. The PDA was giving a low pitch beep every now and then, saying failed password. Alexei just continued re-pressing the generate button. Ven was cleaning the makarov with a piece of cloth. He was deep in the cleaning process, the gun almost completely disassembled. Suddenly, a high pitch beep came from the PDA. Alexei, dozing off, hears the beep and snaps out of it. Ven also looks over, curious to know what happened. Alexei glances over to the screen of the PDA. It flashes in russian, "пароль принимать" (Password Accepted).

"We're in!" spurted Alexei.

Ven puts the cloth down and gets up, anxious to know what's on the chip. The PDA flashed to a file browser, which was in english, and Alexei began digging through the folders.

A few moments pass, and pictures came up on the PDA, "These are.. profiles," said Alexei.

"Of what?" asked Ven. "The appliances?"

"The only stuff here are blueprints, and plans on how the appliances are built."

The dark brown guinea pig spots a file that has a peculiar name, Clusterstorm. He selects the file. Inside are the details of a mission and descriptions of certain people.

"Well shit!" shouted Alexei.

"You found it?" said Ven.

"It's all in this file, called Clusterstorm."

"Clusterstorm?"

"According to this, every machine that saberling makes is called 'clusterstorm'. Their mission is to kill everything on sight."

Ven asks, "Who's responsible?"

"It doesn't tell. It only says the company who makes the appliances, Saberling."

"So they're behind this.."

"Wait."

Alexei scrolls to near the bottom of the file and sees a whole bunch of random code. Part of the code had some numbers, which appear to be coordinates.

He points to the screen and smiles at Ven, "This'll be useful."

There were a few sets of coordinates, but only two seemed readable.

One read, 34°19'0.00"N, 118°59'49.00"W

Another read, 34° 2'25.69"N, 118°13'27.34"W

Alexei saves the coordinates and disconnects the chip. He grabs the radio next to him and powers it on. The machine blows some dust out from not starting for a few years. On top of the radio, had an antenna that could be opened up into a dish. Alexei opens it and connects his PDA to it. Ven stares at the machine, in confusion, begging for an explanation.

"This will connect me to a satellite," explained Alexei. The satellite will help me map out the coordinates to the PDA."

"I thought you said this was a radio," questioned Ven.

"It's a high and low gain antenna reciever, as well as a radio."

"These are the biggest words I've ever heard come out of you."

"Fuck you."

Ven grins slightly, "Can't your PDA connect to the satellite?"

"Only to russian sats. But ever since I got here, It stopped working. The US somehow blocked any incoming links from non-american satellites. Most likely intended to stop people such as myself." Alexei wipes the dust off the radio, "But this reciever can pick up on both types of satellites. It's a little old, but If I can get a link to an american satellite, then I can find out where these coordinates lead to."

The machine's fan oscillates and seems unstable. It beeps, saying it has a successful connection. Alexei begins to type in the coordinates on his PDA. Suddenly the machine bugs out, shutting off.

"What the.." murmured Alexei.

He presses the power button repeatedly, with no response.

"So we're lost now," remarked Ven.

Alexei kicks the machine in hopes that it will power on, no success. He then opens the battery compartment of the radio.

"Battery's dead." sighs Alexei. "I might have more."

Ven takes a seat on the couch as Alexei walks past into his room. He begins to reassemble the pistol, swiftly putting the pieces back together.

Suddenly Alexei grudges, "Fuck, I don't have any."

"There probably some in the breeders home," hollered Ven.

Alexei pauses for a moment, then walks back into the room. "Actually, there might be something better than batteries in that home."

Ven turns to Alexei, "I'm listening..."

"Stay here, I'll be right back."

Alexei grabs the PDA off the desk and exits the home, not giving Ven a chance to nod or respond. Ven accepts the situation and leans back into the couch, finalizing the assembly of the makarov.

 ** _At the Breeders home_**

The sun had almost fully set, sky was clear, and stars beginning to come out. Alexei approaches the breeders home and walks through the broken back door. He first glances at the kitchen and sees that all of the other guinea pigs had left. The kitchen lights were still on, as well as the television, which was still on the news network. Alexei looks around the kitchen and turns to the right; there was a hallway leading to the bedrooms. He moves into the master bedroom, which had a queen size bed in the center. On it was a laptop, with the screen flipped open. Alexei smiles, pleased that he found what he needed. He hops on the bed, gripping the cloth till he reaches the top. He proceeds in front of the laptop and connects his PDA to it via a small USB cable. The computer was locked out, but Alexei manages to bypass it easily, using his PDA's password cracking abilities. Once in, he opens the browser and types in the coordinates found on the chip.

The first location pops on the map. It's a mansion at Somis, California. It's about fifty miles from where they're currently located.

He then searches the second pair of coordinates. It shows on the map an abandoned warehouse, in the middle of downtown Los Angeles. Much closer at about thirteen miles. Alexei takes a mental note on these locations, and continues to research on the chip info saved on the PDA.

 ** _The next morning_**

Ven awakes on the couch, at Alexei's home. He glances around the home, wondering if Alexei had returned. He slowly gets up onto his feet and begins to search around the home. He walks into Alexei's room and takes a glimpse of the bed, still moved from yesterday. The secret compartment was open, but no Alexei present. Ven scratches his head, and walks out the front door onto the porch. It was a misty morning, a slight haze covered the bottom of the valley, and lower part of the village. Ven turns to the breeders home, and studies it. He suddenly realizes where Alexei is, remembering what he said the night prior.

 ** _At the village_**

Ven scurries through the village, heading towards the breeders home. On the way, he spots the doc's house, with a bunch of guinea pigs inside. Some appear to be arguing but Ven could not hear. Ignoring the noise, Ven continues on and approaches the house. He enters through the back door, and spots the hallway that leads into the bedrooms. He walks in, spotting the russian pig up top. Alexei is asleep near the computer, with the PDA still plugged in. Curiously Ven approaches the bed, but the wooden floor squeaks. Alexei immediatly wakes up and looks at Ven.

"Good morning," said Ven.

Alexei doesn't respond, instead just stretches. Ven climbs onto the bed and approaches he laptop.

"Found anything?" asked Ven.

Alexei yawns, "Do you want the short or long version?"

"Is it that much?"

"Yes."

"Okay, the short version."

Alexei moves the mouse pad over to the maps window and clicks on it. "I searched the two coordinates on the map and got these locations."

Alexei points to the first location, which is fifty miles out.

He continues, "This mansion.. belongs to a man named Leanord Saber. He's the CEO of Saberling Appliances, and owns the company."

"He's our target," Ven exclaimed.

"Maybe, but he's already arrested according to this." Alexei clicks on a news page, showing a recent article on the CEO. "It says that he's already detained, and actually has no part of it. According to him, this was supposed to be called Sabersense, not Clusterstorm."

"Sabersense?"

"Something he proposed, saying that each chip inside allows each appliance to communicate to each other."

"Isn't that true.."

"Yes, but it wasn't supposed to turn the machines into murdering contraptions."

Ven gave a confused expression. Alexei clicks on the maps once more, and shows the other location.

"This is the other location found on the chip," explained Alexei. "It's an abandoned warehouse, in the middle of Los Angeles."

"What's there?"

"Nothing. I've spent all night looking for info. All I got, is that it's an abandoned locomotive factory. It's suspicious.."

"Maybe it's like a.. secret lair, or something," questioned Ven. "That's probably where the other guinea pig might be."

"Exactly.."

Ven glares at the computer for a moment, "Where are we?"

Alexei clicks on the gps button, showing they're exact location. Ven studies the screen, and compares the distances between the two locations.

"The warehouse is closer," remarked Ven.

"About thirteen miles," interrupted Alexei. "But considering the roads and hills, I would double that."

"Yes.. But I can't walk that distance, It would take me a week or two."

Alexei smirks, "You don't have to walk."

"What?"

Alexei closes the laptop and hops off the bed.

"Follow," said Alexei, signaling to Ven.

The two guinea pigs walk out the bedroom and eventually out of the house. As they walk out, they spot the remainder of the village guinea pigs gathered at the doc's house. A couple were complaining about the village and how poor the living quality is.

"I'm sorry, but we honestly could have a better life out in the wild!" shouted a guinea pig.

"Well good luck getting eaten!" shouted Ellis, the doc.

"We'll be fine, at least we will have a chance at food!"

The guinea pigs continued to squabble as Ven and Alexei walk by.

"The village is going to shit," thought Alexei to himself. "I might have to change locations soon.."

Ven followed behind, continuing to ignore the village members as he's too curious to know where Alexei is taking him.

 ** _Alexei's home_**

Alexei leads Ven into his home, roaming into the bedroom to re open the secret compartment. Inside are the keys that Ven studied earlier. Alexei takes them out and walks out the back door, Ven still following. He continues to roams out into the wilderness towards the edge of the hill, leading into the valley. Alexei hops down and continues through the dense grass, until reaching a dark, dense part of the valley. He breaks through a rough patch of grass, that leads to a clear area. He stops short and waits for Ven. Ven breaks through, and sees it.

"Woah." said Ven softly.

It was a miniature dune buggy, covered in leaves. It was orange in color, and had a small roll cage. The vehicle had seats for two, and a open compartment in the rear for equipment. A gas tank was located in between the seats and the rear compartment, next to it, a small motor. Alexei walks closer to the vehicle, clearing the leaves off.

"This.. Is yours?" wondered Ven.

"Yup, used it to move around here in the US."

"I'm surprised you never shown me this."

"Never needed too."

Ven walked around the vehicle, checking it out, "So, we're using this to check out the warehouse?"

"If it starts.." Alexei hops into the buggy, "It's been sitting here for a couple of years, only being started every few months.."

Ven stands back, as Alexei sticks the key into the ignition. He turns the key, turning the motor with hesitation. After a few attempts, the motor begins to sputter to life. Suddenly, black smoke comes out of the tiny muffler in the back and the engine roars to life.

"Ha, I knew she would start!" shouted Alexei.

Ven smiles and walks up to the passenger side of the buggy, looking inside.

"Well?" said Alexei to Ven. "Hop in!"

Ven pauses for a moment, then jumps in the passenger seat. Alexei grabs the stick and sets it to 'Drive'. The buggy jerks forward, then Alexei stomps on the gas. The motor billows out more smoke, then speeds off with great acceleration. Ven and Alexei bounce around in the vehicle, as it has no seatbelts. Alexei drifts it around the tree, then makes his way back up the hill towards his house. The vehicle cuts through the grass with no effort and ramps the hill at the top of the valley. It goes airborn for a few moments, but lands perfectly. Alexei then powerslides next to his home, parking it almost perfectly perpindicular to the house.

"Wow.." said Ven. "I think we can pull this this off."

"She'll definetaly get you there and back no problem," responded Alexei.

A small beep then came from the buggy, Alexei looks at the gauge.

"It needs gas.." said Alexei.

He turns off the vehicle and gets out. Ven grabs the roll cage and pulls himself out, while Alexei walks inside his home. He comes back out with a knife and a small bucket.

"Here, take the buggy to the old ladies car," said Alexei handing Ven the tools. "She's not gonna need it anymore, so cut a hole from the bottom of her gas tank, and fill her up."

Ven nods and puts the bucket in the back, but stops short.

"Curious.. Are you driving there?" asked Ven.

"You are."

"I don't know how to drive a car."

"You gonna learn."

"Uh, okay."

Alexei points to the drivers seat, "Get in."

Ven walks around to the drivers side of the buggy, and hesitates to get in, slightly nervous. Once inside, Alexei walks up to Ven, poining at the various instruments.

"That's the gas, press down on it to go faster, next to it is the brake. Press on that to slow down." Alexei then points to the transmission. "That stick is what makes you get into gear, it has four modes. Drive high and low, neutral and reverse. Drive low will make you go about two to five miles per hour. Drive high will get up to almost twenty. Neutral and reverse are self explanatory."

"I'm assuming this gauge is for telling me how fast im going," said Ven, pointing to the speedometer. "And this is for the amount of fuel available?"

"Yes, exactly. It's not hard, try and start it up."

Ven turns the key and the buggy starts up without hesitation. He puts his hands on the wheel, vibrating from the engine.

"Now," instructed Alexei. "Put the transmission into Drive High."

Ven grabs the stick and swiftly puts the vehicle into gear, the buggy jolts foreward.

"Now remember, Gas and brake!" shouted Alexei. "Now, go get some gas before it runs out."

Ven presses on the gas slightly and the buggy accelerates away. He grabs the wheel and turns it towards the tree.

"This is.. easy!" thought Ven to himself. He gathers confidence and accelerates to the tree and circles around it a few times. The buggy beeps again, saying it needs fuel. Ven then drives away from Alexei and heads to the front of the breeders home, siphoning fuel from the breeders car.

 ** _A few minutes later_**

Ven returns with a full tank, as well as a full bucket of gasoline. Alexei is sitting on his back porch, he spots Ven and approaches him.

"Well done, how was it?" asked Alexei.

"It was surprisingly easy," answered Ven.

"Good, now turn it off and come inside.. We have some planning to do."

"Planning?"

"Come in, I have something to show you."

"You're just full of surprises today."

Ven cuts the motor, and follows Alexei inside, curious once more on what's about to happen.


	14. Mission Brief

Chapter 14: Mission Brief

Ven enters the dark home, and shuts the door behind him. On the wall to the right, a board was setup. On it, were some pictures being held up by push pins. The pictures contained various locations, some were just drawings. Alexei gestures to Ven to sit on the couch.

"Your training.. is about to be put to the test," said the russian pig.

"I feel like that's everyday now," answered Ven.

"No, this will be the final test."

"Explain."

"This is an actual mission, also your first." Alexei turns to the board, and points to the first picture. It was a map, showing their location. "We're here, and here is the enemy location. This mission spans two days. Day one starts tomorrow morning. Take the buggy, and travel to the enemy location. Based off the distance, it might take you several hours to arrive."

Alexei points to the warehouse picture, then continues. "Once you get there, infiltrate the warehouse, and scout the area. If you spot any clues involving clusterstorm, you're in the right place. There is a chance that you might encounter the enemy, aka your evil twin.. If you do see him, subdue and capture him."

"I'm surprised you don't want me to shoot on site," said Ven.

"If the pistol was suppressed, then maybe. This is a stealth mission, don't give off your position. Once you capture him and clear the area, your free to do as you wish."

"Got it."

"Anyway, once you leave, you're most likely gonna need fuel. The bucket of fuel you brought is your tank of gas to get back. By the time you do all that, it should be late afternoon. You're going to need to find a place to rest for the night, I'll leave that up to you. Leave as soon as you wake up, then be here by noon the next day."

Alexei pauses for a moment, "Sadly, I will not be joining you due to the fact that I've grown old and would be a hindrance to the mission."

He reaches for the holster besides him sitting on the kitchen table. He places it on another small table in front of Ven, sliding it to him. "This is your mission... Use it if you have too."

Ven gazed at the pistol, "I understand."

"Use the satellite reciever for GPS," said Alexei. "I found batteries in the old ladies home, so it should be working for the entirety of the mission. Do you have any questions?"

"I don't," answered Ven.

"We need to start packing the buggy with supplies... Grab some food and put it on the buggy. I need to get those batteries from the home."

"Sounds good."

The two guinea pigs split apart gathering supplies for the mission. Alexei headed towards the breeders home to grab some batteries to power the GPS, and Ven stays to pack the vehicle. The gathering took a few hours, and they finish by late afternoon.

"That should work," said Alexei, tightening the GPS down with a small strap in the back of the buggy.

The buggy was almost completely full. In the trunk area, it had food and water to last three full days. It also included the satellite reciever, which had a wire running to the front of vehicle. The wire led to Alexei's PDA to show their current position. Also in the back was the bucket of extra gas, sealed off so that it won't spill. In a small compartment behind the drivers seat, was some extra tools and parts Ven might need in case of emergencies. The passenger seat was empty, and for good reason.

"On the floor of the passenger side..." said Alexei. "I put a big bag there for you to gather some evidence, it's big enough to fit a body if need be."

"Oh that's nice," said Ven. "At least I don't have to look at a dead carcus on the way back.

"I look after my comrades."

"I'm pretty sure you just don't want blood on the seats."

"Alexei smirks, "Let's grab some dinner."

Alexei begins to walk towards his home. Ven glances at the village, specifically at his home. He begins to wonder on the health of his mother.

"I'll be right back," said Ven.

Alexei turns and sees Ven staring at the village. He knows what Ven is thinking.

"You're gonna miss dinner," said Alexei.

"I won't, just need to check on someone."

"Whatever, I'll be here."

Ven goes on all fours and heads towards the main village.

 ** _At the village_**

Ven approaches the village and notices the lack of people around. Suddenly, he gets stopped by a couple of pigs.

"Ven!" shouted one of the pigs.

It was Hugo. With him was Julie. Ven turns to the pig, wondering why he got stopped.

"We don't want any trouble," said the old pig.

"I'm only here to check on my mother," said Ven.

"Are you? Where's Alexei?"

"He's back at his home."

"I see, you and him are.. uh, not really popular right now."

"I can tell, being that everyone is hiding."

"For good reason, I'm trying to keep everyone safe. So don't take this the wrong way, but for right now, can you leave the village?"

"I live here.."

"I understand that, but for the best interest of the people, you and Alexei need to stay away for a few days."

"I just want to check on Elliot, then I'll leave."

Hugo pauses, then lets on a sigh, "I literally can't stop you Ven.. So please, make it quick."

Ven looks away from the two, re-focusing on his home. He scurries away to the half destroyed house. He spots a guinea pig near his doorway, it's Tibbetts.

Ven approaches, "Tibbetts? What are you doing here?" asked Ven.

"Ven?" said Tibbetts. "I was wondering about you."

"Why are you here?"

"It's literally the only place I can be left alone."

"You're home doesn't count?"

"It does, but people visit that place too often. I like being here, alone."

Ven takes a peak inside, "She's doing better," said Tibbetts. "Resting right now... Sorry but, she is definitaly paralyzed for life."

Ven opens the door and walks inside, Elliot awakes as Ven approaches her.

"You're back.. Ven," sofly whispered Elliot.

"I have some news," said Ven.

"News?"

"We might have found the people on the TV."

"You mean the one that looks like you?"

"Maybe, I really don't know."

"I don't get how."

"Alexei had his ways."

Tibbetts overhears the conversation, and eavesdrops in.

"So what now?" asked Elliot.

"We came up with a plan, to kidnap the people who did this."

"The people who did this might be more than just that one pig."

"It's a dangerous mission."

"Yeah, a little much for you, don't you think?"

"I'll be fine."

"Your confidence is gonna get you killed, Ven. I can't afford that please."

"Alexei gave me his pistol for the mission, I can defend myself."

"Please be safe.." Elliot pauses for a moment, "How long are you gonna be gone?"

"Only for tomorrow. I should be back the day after, hopefully with the dead body of a guinea pig."

Elliot looked concerned, "Ven, If you find him, don't kill him.. Revenge get's you no where, everyone has the right to life. Let him tell his story."

"I'll try."

"And please again, don't get hurt. If I lose you, I wouldn't have a reason to be on this planet."

"I'll be fine, but Alexei is a different story."

"Keep an eye on him please."

"I trust his judgement." Ven looks out the window, "See you when I get back."

Elliot places her hand onto Ven, a warm touch from a mother in distress. Ven smiles, then turns and hops out the window, glancing at her one last time before running away. Tibbetts watches as Ven scurries off back to Alexei's.

"He found the people who caused this?" murmured Tibbetts to himself. "Finally, the village can see that Ven isn't the enemy here."


	15. Road Trip

Chapter 15: Road Trip

The next morning was cool, and crisp; Light fog gathered in the valley and the grass was misty. The sun barely risen, and skies clear. Ven puts on the holster and tightens the strap. He then slides in the makarov, holding two full magazines, then closes the pouch. Ven sighs, then walks out the back door, where Alexei is setting up the GPS on the satellite reciever.

"It's 0530," remarked Alexei. "You should arrive around 1300."

"Eight hours." responded Ven.

"It's a lengthy trip, I'd recommend taking a small break every other hour or so."

"I hope this intel is right."

"We'll see tomorrow."

Ven walks by Alexei, and hops in the driver side of the buggy. The GPS is set for the warehouse and the route is shown. Ven inserts the key into the ignition and starts the motor. Alexei comes up to the driver side and leans inwards towards Ven.

"Remember.." spoke Alexei. "In then out, you're not there for scene viewing. Stay focused and don't get distracted. Only use the makarov as a last resort, you only have two mags."

"Understood," said Ven. "Don't worry, I promise I will return with revenge."

Alexei grins, proud of his teachings that passed onto Ven over the years.

He backs away from the vehicle, "Good luck, old friend."

Ven nods, and puts the vehicle into drive and speeds off. Alexei watches until the buggy goes out of sight, then returns indoors into his home. In the distance, Tibbetts watches Ven take off in the vehicle, wishing the best of luck to Ven as well.

 ** _A couple hours pass_**

A small village gathering is taking place near the doc's home. Most of the guinea pigs have recovered from the traumatizing experience, and are now more focused on food and the future of the village. The population of the village is down to about twenty guinea pigs. The others seperated themselves from the village, living in the wild and fending for themselves. The remainder gathered at the doc's home, debating.

"Okay everyone," said Hugo. "You are what's left of the village. We have enough food gathered from the breeders home to last about three or four more days. I believe we can rebuild.."

"We need to build more homes," remarked Ellis, the doctor. "I can't have ten of you living with me at once, unless you need medical care."

"Does anyone know how to build a home?" asked the lead pig.

"Alexei does," shouted one guinea pig. "He built his own home, right?"

"Yes.." said Hugo. "But I don't think he's willing to help us."

"Force him.. He's part of this village."

"I'd rather not force the guy who has a gun."

"What other choice do we have?"

Hugo thought for a moment, and couldn't really think of any other answers.

He sighs, "The most we can do is ask.. Even that's kinda risky."

"We also gotta worry about Ven, they're always together.."

"Not today," spoke Tibbetts, hiding in the back if the crowd.

Everyone turned, then Hugo questioned, "What do you mean?"

Tibbetts stands up straight, "He's not with Alexei right now, he's out on a mission."

"A mission? How do you know this?"

"I heard it myself, and saw Ven leave earlier this morning. Him and Alexei claim they found the people responsible for the destruction. Ven is on a mission to bring back the person we saw on the TV."

"That's impossible," said Ellis.

"You can shit a brick for all I care," shouted Tibbetts.

"Oh, that's it-"

"No, STOP!" spurted Hugo. "We're not doing this bullshit again! We need to work together if we're gonna survive."

The two guinea pigs settle down and re focus their attention.

"Go on.." said the lead pig.

"He's going to get revenge for the destruction of our village. He should be back by tomorrow around noon."

"Interesting, but that doesn't help our current situation."

Ellis sighs, "So Tibbetts, do you have a plan?"

"No, having Alexei help us rebuild homes might actually be our best bet."

"You think you can go and ask him?" wondered Hugo.

"I can't go.. Last time I got near that house, I had a gun two inches from my face."

"Hmm, maybe if we get him on his good side.."

"Does he even have a good side?" asked Ellis.

"Everyone has a good side, we just need to know what he likes."

"Isn't he russian?" asked another pig. "Just give him some Vodka and women, he'll cheer up."

"Where are we gonna get Vodka?" said Hugo.

"Well, we got women." The guinea pig points to the back, where two beautiful girls stand together. "He's an older man, he'll love 'em."

"Na-ah, we are not going in that house with that man!" shouted one of the girls.

"I agree," said Ellis. "I'm not gonna let those girls go anywhere near Alexei."

Hugo heavily, "W-we actually might have no choice."

The two girls expression turned pale, dreaded on the choices everyone is making.

Hugo looks the girls, "Just go in there and act, uh.. sexy.. Convince him to help out the village."

The girls retaliate, "No! It's not happening."

"Please.. You're the last hope of the village."

Tibbetts walks up to the girls, "Alexei isn't gonna hurt you. Trust me, he's pretty fond of girls, and soft around them."

"How do you know?"

"I knew the last girls who would go every other night, they actually enjoyed it."

"And where are these girls?"

Tibbetts looks down in sorrow, "Umm, I'd rather not say."

Hugo continues, "Please.. if you can get him to trust us, we can all live a better life."

The girls look at each other, contemplating an answer. They glance around, seeing the desperation in the village. After a few moments, they turn to the village leader.

"Fine.." one of the girls said annoyingly. "We'll do it."

"Oh thank god," Hugo. "Thank you so much, you're in debt to this village."

"When do we go?"

"Later tonight, when it's quiet."

"Do we just ask or.."

"Stay with him, have a little fun. Get him in such a mood, that he'll do anything to please you. That's when you'll drop the questions."

"Okay, we'll try."

Ellis looks down, hands on his face in embarassment, "I can't believe we're actually doing this."

Hugo looks down besides Ellis, "I'm sorry, we have to do what's right for the village."

"Still, I don't like where this is going," answered Ellis.

"Me neither, but we'll see what happens."

 ** _A few more hours pass_**

Ven is minutes away from the location. He drives around the city of Los Angeles, avoiding as much attention as possible. Ven has never been in the city before, so he takes in the scenery, but mostly stays focused on the mission. The journey has been eventful, but went well for the most part. He looks at the GPS, stating that the warehouse is around the corner. Ven starts getting anxious as his vehicle approaches the corner. He get's the first actual view of the street. It was empty, and had trash littered all over the ground. He spots a large warehouse down the street that says "ACME" on the top. He looks at the building in bewilderment. Is this the place Ven was looking for?


	16. The Abandoned Warehouse?

Chapter 16: The Abandoned Warehouse?

Ven stops the buggy down the street from the abandoned warehouse, and looks the PDA. The time shows 1241, twenty minutes ahead of schedule. He studies the building from the distance, at the top it reads 'ACME Exterminators Pest Control'.

"Pest Control?", said Ven to himself.

He drives closer to get a better look, but stays out of sight. Ven comes up to next to the warehouse, and parks it next to a fence, out of view of the building. He turns off the buggy, and gets out. Ven scurries up against a neighboring building, and peaks around the corner. The warehouse looked old, but not abandoned. Suddenly, Ven spots a security camera, then multiple security camera's all over the building.

But were the cameras active?

Why would a pest company have this much security?

Are the people even still here?

These are questions Ven asked himself, suspicion surrounded this area. He takes a quick moment to find a secure entrance to the building. Up, on top of the building were no cameras, and had windows; perfect for surveillance. Ven grins, then makes his way across the driveway, keeping himself out of sight from the cameras. He goes up against the brick wall of the warehouse. A small rain gutter ran down the building beside Ven. He approaches the gutter and grabs hold onto the side, following it up to the roof. Once on top, Ven scuttles along the hot surface and spots the main windows. One of them appeared to be shattered, but was covered by a plastic black trash bag. Ven approaches the window and moves the bag aside to get a look at the interior.

"What the..", murmured Ven in awe.

Located inside was not the typical pest control tools you'd expect. Instead, a elaborate set of pipes, and equipment. Man made tools, housing, and gear flooded the interior of the warehouse. Ven quickly realizes that this no pest control operation, and is definitely sure that this the location of the enemy him and Alexei have been searching for. Suddenly, voices in the distance, coming from other side of the building. It sounded like people conversating, but Ven was too far away to comprehend. He knows he has to go inside to get a better look, so he takes a moment to prepare himself. Ven glances down to the makarov, and unholsters it. He loads a round into the chamber, then reholsters the pistol. Ven takes a deep breath, then enters the building, following the sounds. He travels along the wall, on the piping. As Ven travels, he studies the interior, taking a mental note of everything he sees. Suddenly, he spots a glimpse of a person around some gear. The man was standing upright, his back towards Ven. Ven quickly gets out of sight behind a small wall above ground. Ven was a lot closer now, and could clearly understand the conversation. He peeks over the wall, and eavesdrops in.

"Like I said earlier.." said the man. "We need to make sure we stay out of publicity." The man points to something on the table, out of sight to Ven. "Blaster, especially you.."

"What I do?" asked another voice. The voice was slightly harsh, but comedical.

The man continued, "You're the loudest mouth here, so I need you to take extra precaution out on the field." The man returns his attention to what seems to be a group of people. "This operation needs to stay classified. If it goes public, we will get shut down.. again."

Ven attempts to see who the man was talking too, but no one seemed to be in the area. Ven began to move to a better spot, then stopped short. He did a double take on what he saw next. A rodent came in view, it was a guinea pig. A silver agouti guinea came up to the man and spoke. She was wearing what looked like a small earring on one ear, and in the other, a weird device. The device had a small microphone leading to the front of the guinea pigs mouth.

"Don't worry Ben," said the guinea pig. It was a female with a spaniard accent. She continued, "I can take care of the boys."

The man, Ben, responded, "I hope so.. Juarez, please keep them in check, I don't want another thing like this to happen again."

"I'll do my best."

Ven was boggled by the fact a guinea pig just spoke to a human. But more importantly, Ven wondered why they seem disgruntled.

Ben turned his head, "Darwin?"

"Yes?", said another voice. It was a lower pitch voice, similar to Ven's in tone.

"The Clusterstorm mission was definitely a success, and proved us out in the field. But this news thing really blew out of proportion. In the future, if you can, keep your head down."

"Understood."

"Darwin, I always believed in you, let's not blow what took years to build."

Ven hears the word, 'clusterstorm'. This confirmed to Ven that he was in the right place. Although, Ven was incredibly curious on who Darwin was, and moves to the right while staying in cover to get a better look. He once again, peeks over the small wall, spotting another pig looking at Ben. It was him, the one from the television. He looked identical to Ven, almost indistinguishable. He too, was wearing the device on his ear. Ven trembles for a second, in disbelief that he's this close to the enemy. His heart rate increases, small flashbacks from clusterstorm come back, distracting him. He goes back into cover to calm himself down. After a few moments of gathering his thoughts, he peeks back over the wall. Darwin and Ben had just finished conversing and they split up, Ben points to another guinea pig. A black guinea pig shows up. He had a white patch of fur on his nose, and was wearing the device as well.

"Blaster, can I speak to you in private?" said Ben.

"Why me?" said the black guinea pig, Blaster.

"You're not in trouble."

"I hope not, I need to get back to training."

The two head into a smaller room, below Ven. Ven re focuses onto Darwin, who appears to be walking towards a indoor compound. Ven takes action, and quietly follows Darwin from the distance, staying out of sight. Darwin heads to the top of the small compound. It was a three story compound, with what appears to be a bedroom on each floor. The bedrooms' interiors were blocked out of sight, making it a perfect place for Ven to strike.

Ven watches Darwin closely from the distance, seeing him about to enter the room. Darwin's room in specific was on the top floor of the compound. Nothing was above it but a flat roof. Darwin approaches his room, the entry door marked the letter 'D'. He goes in and shuts the door behind him. Ven rushes along the side of the building, staying on the pipes and keeping out of sight. He comes up above the compound, and looks around before jumping down. Swiftly and quietly, Ven hops on the roof of the compound, making sure that he doesn't make any noise.

He comes up above Darwin's door, and thinks of the best course of action. The roof of the enclosure had debris laying everywhere, and clearly looked unfinished. Ven began to look around for anything useful. He quickly spots a small metal rod that fits perfectly in his hand. Taking the rod, Ven places it down next to the door, trying not to make any noise. On the door, was a small ledge running along the top. Ven carefully stands on the ledge directly above the door, back against the wall balancing himself. He pauses for a moment, then uses the bottom of a foot to knock on the door. He knocks twice, then waits. Ven hears footsteps coming from inside room, the door opens.

Darwin looks outside his room to see no one in the vicinity. Suddenly, Ven swoops down turning around and grabbing the ledge, kicking Darwin in the chest. The sweeping lunge kick knocks Darwin off his feet onto the ground behind him. The force knocks the wind out of him, and he groans. Ven lands on his feet, and picks up the metal rod. He scuttles inside the room and approaches Darwin. Darwin gasps for air, then glances at the intruder; he attempts to get up. Ven takes no time for Darwin to react and swings the rod, hitting him in the head. The force of the blow came with a small amount of fur and blood, as Darwin drops to the ground, unconscious.

* * *

 **Finally G-Force is directly involved! Now I can officially call this a G-force fanfic.**


	17. Kidnap!

Chapter 17: Kidnap!

Ven stared at the battered body, lifeless in front of him. He places the pole out of sight, then peeks outside, making sure nobody had heard him. Wasting no time, he returns to Darwin, picking up the body and carrying it outside the room. On the way out, he spots the device Darwin was using to talk to humans. It was knocked off Darwin's head when Ven swung the rod. He picks it up, then leaves the room. After shutting the door, he makes sure nobody has spotted him, then dashes out of sight.

 ** _Outside_**

Ven places Darwin next to the buggy, then grabs the big bag Alexei had given him. He opens it, laying it flat on the ground. Ven once again returns his attention towards Darwin, astonished by the fact they look so similar. Trying to put that aside, he picks up Darwin, and places him as well as the small device into the bag. He then places the bag into the buggy's passenger seat, securing it down so that it won't shift around. Ven leaves the bag slightly open so that Darwin could breath, he wants him to be alive when they return. Ven then hops into the driver's seat and starts up the buggy. He puts the vehicle into 'Drive', and takes a glance at the warehouse. Hesitating to drive off, Ven contemplates whether if he could have done more.

He turns to the body bag, "Who did I just kidnap?" Ven asked himself.

Curious to know more, he shuts off the vehicle and gets out, heading back inside the warehouse.

 ** _At Darwin's room_**

Ven successfully re enters the warehouse unseen and it appears that no one has noticed Darwin's 'disappearance'. Ven takes this time to head back into Darwin's room to get more info on his motives. As we walks in, he shuts the door behind him and scours the room for info. He comes up to a drawer and a table. On top of the tabel was a golden badge. Ven picks up the badge, studying it carefully. On it, was marked "FEDERAL BUREAU OF INVESTIGATION". On the bottom marked, "SPECIAL AGENT".

"Special Agent?" murmured Ven to himself. "The FBI is behind this?"

He digs through the folders in his drawers. In them were mostly just pictures of the other guinea pigs, but one paper stood out the most. It was a folder of some sorts. On the top read, "SECRET, FOR OFFICIAL USE ONLY". Ven opens the folder to see a photo of Darwin, paper clipped to a stack of other papers. On the first page, showed Darwin's personal info.

 _ **Name: Darwin**_

 _ **Occupation: Commander, Leader of G-Force**_

 _ **DOB: Exact Date Unknown (2007)**_

 _ **Age: 2**_

 _ **Race: Guinea Pig**_

 _ **Affiliation: Federal Bureau of Investigation**_

 _ **Family: Unknown**_

 _ **Origin: Unknown**_

 _ **Reporting Individual: Ben**_

 _ **Known Affiliates: Juarez, Blaster, Mooch, Speckles...**_

The page continued with a plethora of information. Soon, Ven lost track of time, and had spent about 5 minutes in the room. The door knocks. Ven freezes in position hoping if he doesn't answer, they will leave. Suddenly the door opens, It was Juarez.

"Darwin?", said Juarez.

Ven doesn't respond, instead he keeps his back against her.

"Can I come in?" asked the spaniard guinea pig.

Ven puts down the folder back into the drawer, closing it.

Juarez enters the room, slowly getting closer to Ven, "Are you.. Okay?" She pauses waiting for a response, nothing. "I know you're upset from what happened, but there's no need to give me the silent treatment."

Ven continues to stand still as Juarez approaches Ven. She notices the belt and holster.

"What are you wearing?" asked Juarez, in a desperate attempt to start a conversation.

"..."

Juarez comes up directly behind Ven. She places her right rand onto Ven's back, softly rubbing his fur.

Juarez carefully lifts her hand to rest onto his shoulders, "Darwin?"

She reaches around, attempting to hug Ven. Immediately, Ven ducks down and elbows Juarez in the nose; blood immediately began to trickle down her face. She shrieks in pain, dazed and confused. Before she even got a chance to retract her arm, Ven grabs hold of it and pulls Juarez over his shoulders. Her elbow snaps, causing her arm to rotate in a very unnatural angle. Juarez yelps as her body slams onto the ground. It was so loud, that everyone in the building could hear it. Ven had to shut her up, so he swiftly kicks her face, knocking her out, and cracking the jaw line. Suddenly voices began to ring from outside, Ven's cover is blown. He quickly peeks out, spotting Blaster, who was rushing in his direction.

Blaster spots Ven from afar, "Darwin!" shouted Blaster, also fooled by the appearance. "What happened!?"

Ven quickly runs in the opposite direction towards the pipes and makes his way towards the windows.

"Darwin!?" shouted Blaster. "Where ya going!?"

Blaster approaches Darwin's door, and sees Juarez, bruised and bleeding on the floor. He takes a second to comprehend what happened.

Ben catches up, "What's going on?"

"I don't know!" responded Blaster. "Juarez is hurt though!" Blaster goes and tends to the beaten pig."

"Where's Darwin?" asked Ben.

"He ran away, but I swear I'm gonna kill him for hurting Juarez!"

"Ran away?"

Ben searches the area, and spots Ven, almost at the exit.

"There he is!" shouted Ben.

"Where!?" shouted Blaster.

Ben points to the guinea pig, frantically running away.

Blaster puts down Juarez softly, and preps himself, "Oh that's it!"

"Blaster let him!" hollered Ben.

"No!" Blaster began to chase Ven.

Ven escapes the warehouse and goes through the window, stopping for only a second to check behind him. He then continues to dash across the rooftop, approaching the gutter. Ven prepares to climb down.

"STOP!" shouted Blaster.

Ven pauses and turns around, Blaster just a few feet away. He takes a close look at Ven's face, and expression.

"Wait.." said Blaster. "You're not Darwin.. Who are you!?"

Ven slightly grins, then pulls out the makarov and fires at Blaster. The sound echoes throughout the area, then a shell hits the ground besides Ven.

"Agh!" screeched Blaster as blood starts flowing down the black fur.

He was hit in the left shoulder, and was on the ground, unable to move. Ven points the gun at Blaster's head, prepared to finish him off.

Blaster held his arm on the wound as he looked upon Ven.

"Do it!" shouted Blaster.

Ven knew in the back of his mind, no witnesses. But he also thought about what his mother had said about the right to life. Ven contemplates for a moment, on the trigger. Then the decision came to him, and he holsters the pistol. Ven turns his back and slides down the rain gutter into freedom. Meanwhile, Blaster lays his head on the ground, sighs heavily and tries to not bleed out.

Ven quickly approaches the buggy, and hops in. He turns it on and floors it, getting as far away as possible from the area.


	18. Enemies Are Closer Than They Appear

Chapter 18: Enemies Are Closer Than They Seem

 ** _A few hours later, at the G-force Headquarters_**

In the infirmary, Blaster and Juarez recover from the incident. Blaster had a small patch on his shoulder, and was keeping pressure on the wound. The bleeding had stopped for the most part, and had mainly consisted of clotted blood. Juarez was in a cast for her broken arm, and could barely speak from the fractured jaw. Her nose was also broken so blood occasionally trickled down her face. Both of the guinea pigs were in small cots, recovering.

Ben walks in, "How you guys doing?"

"Do we need to answer..", said Juarez, with a muffled voice.

"I told Marcie everything. Her, Hurley, and the rest should be back from clearance in a couple of days."

Juarez looks off to the side, "For once, I wish Hurley was here.. Would cheer things up."

"What? Am I not entertaining enough?" interrupted Blaster.

"Nothin's entertaining about you, Blaster."

"That's cold Juarez.. I'm over here taking bullets for you, and you say that?"

"My hero.." Juarez rolled her eyes.

"Speaking of bullets..", said Ben. "I found the shell from the bullet that hit you Blaster. It's custom made steel, I've ever seen that before. I'm actually more boggled on how a cartridge that small can still launch a lethal bullet." He looks at Blaster, "Did you see exactly if it was a gun?"

"It was, semi automatic.. kinda wish I had one."

"Yeah well, your mission is not to shoot guns."

"Why not? He had one."

Juarez interrupted, "How did Darwin even get a gun?"

"That wasn't Darwin.." said Blaster.

"What? Yes it was."

"No, it wasn't. When I got a better look at him on the rooftop, his expression.. It was.. different."

"That's impossible! Then who was that in his room?"

"An imposter," remarked Blaster.

"...I guess that explains his different fighting style."

Blaster got curious, "Oh yeah, about that.. What happened?"

"I wasn't expecting it."

"I thought you were miss karate.."

"And I thought that was Darwin, but looked who both got fooled, idioto.."

Blaster pauses, "So.. where is the real Darwin?"

Ben joins in, "I don't know, I've shoulda implanted those tracking chips in when I got the chance. I guess I'd never expect this to happen."

"My question's still the same, who was the imposter?" asked Juarez. "None of this makes sense."

"I don't know," said Ben. "But whoever it was, clearly was more skilled than you thought..."

 ** _Meanwhile, In the buggy_**

A small, high pitch beep rang around the buggy. Ven, distracted by the beep, looks down from the road. The gas tank was almost empty, and sunlight was dying. Ven began to look around for viable places to camp out for the night. He comes up to shipping warehouse, with minimal company. Ven pulls over and finds a small tunnel leading inside the warehouse. Inside was dark, desolate, and was full of boxes and shelves. Ven parks the buggy out of sight and turns it off. He jumps out and begins to service the buggy with the bucket of fuel, loaded from the beginning of the trip. After filling the tank, he grabs the remaining fuel, as well as some wood lying around, and builds a small fire.

The sunlight was now completely gone, and Ven was ready to tucker in for the night. Suddenly, a small grumble came from the guinea pigs stomach. Ven hasn't eaten since he left, so he makes his way to the buggy. He grabs an IRP and opens it up. Inside were various fruits and vegetables, as well as crackers, stored in metal cans for freshness. Ven attempts to read the front of the packaging to determine the flavor, but couldn't understand the language. He then unfolds a piece of paper that was inside the package, listed was the instructions; also in russian. Ven gives a blank expression, slightly cringes, then crumbles the paper. He tosses it behind him and begins to walk back to the fire. He pauses suddenly to look at the body bag. He's unsure if Darwin will stay unconsious throughout the night, so he drags the body bag next to the fire as well. This way, Ven could keep a close eye on him. He opens up the bag, and takes Darwin out. He then ties up Darwin's arms to his back, then lays him up against the wall of the warehouse, close to the fire. The battered guinea pig had blood had dried onto his fur, discoloring it. He also had a long, straight bruise, from where the rod had hit him, as well as a black eye on the left side.

 ** _A few hours pass_**

Darwin slowly opens his right eye, dazed, and blurry visioned. He attempts to look around the area, glancing around the warehouse. Eventually, his eyes rest onto the fire in front of him. Next to it, was Ven, staring right at him. Darwin snaps awake, opening his other eye. He attempts to move, but realizes he's tied up. After a few moments of struggling, he relaxes, then looks upon Ven.

"You're gonna regret doing this," said Darwin.

Ven doesn't respond, instead he turnes to the fire and relaxes.

"W-Who are you?" asked Darwin.

No response.

A few moments pass, "Do you speak?"

"I have nothing to say to you," said Ven.

Darwin leaned back against the wall, "Can you at least tell me what you want with me?"

No response.

Darwin looks around the warehouse once more, studying the area, "Is this where you live?"

Ven getting rapidly annoyed with the questions, get's up, and walks away from the fire. He heads to the buggy, and cleans up the mess from the food earlier. Darwin struggles with the string, tied behind his back. Luckily, Ben taught him how to escape from situations like this. He does a small trick with his hand, and finds a loose spot. Darwin manages to get the string loose without Ven noticing. He waits for Ven to look in the other direction, then goes out of sight from Ven.

Meanwhile, Ven finishes cleaning the buggy and turns around to Darwin. The guinea pig was gone, and the string was on the ground. Ven stopped short, and had a confused expression. Suddenly, Ven feels a tug in his holster. Darwin snatches the makarov and attempts to aim at Ven. Ven almost immediatly reacts and grabs Darwin's hand, twisting it until his wrist breaks, causing him to drop the gun. Ven then kicks Darwin, knocking the wind out of him. Darwin flies back a few inches, and drops to the ground. He attempts to quickly get back up and dive for the pistol, but Ven was much quicker, grabbing the makarov before Darwin could even get on his feet. He switches the safety off, and aims at Darwin. Darwin, still determined, attempts to attack Ven, a last ditch effort for his life. Ven aims directly at Darwin's head, then last second, switches to his right leg, and fires.

The bullet goes through Darwin's leg and ricochet's in the distance. Darwin screeches in pain and drops to the ground, blood starts gathering on his fur, then on the floor. Ven walks up to Darwin and kicks his face, he falls onto his back, laying upright. For once in his life, Darwin felt real fear, knowing that he may die in the next few minutes.

"Please!" shouted Darwin in desperation. "Who are you!? Why do you look like me!?"

"I could ask you the same thing, but I have my own question for you," responded Ven. "Do you know this pain you're feeling right now. This.. suffering?"

Darwin doesn't answer.

"No answer? This is the pain me and my family went through during clusterstorm."

"W-wait, what?"

"Do you recognize that word?"

"How the hell do you know about clusterstorm?" asked Darwin.

"That doesn't matter, what does matter is that you will die for building those machines."

"Machines?"

Ven aims the pistol right at Darwin's face, and slowly puts pressure on the trigger.

Darwin raises his hands in front of the gun, "Hold on! Hold on! You're misunderstood! I'm not part of clusterstorm! Me and my team-"

Ven shoots the ground next to Darwin, "I saw you and a mole on top of a giant machine on the TV. You and your team is what caused all of this!"

"What? No, Let me explain!" shouted Darwin.

Ven re-aims the guns at Darwin's face but doesn't shoot. He waits for a response.

Darwin continues, "I work for the government, me and my team were tasked of stopping clusterstorm, but were too late. Although, after a few minutes, we did manage to shut it down using a virus. The mole you saw was Speckles, he was the one behind clusterstorm."

Ven grudged, "Do you have any idea how much I went through in those 'few minutes'?"

"I'm sorry, we couldn't stop it in time. Speckles is the one you're after."

"Where is he?"

"In custody of the FBI, he's fixing what he started."

"And the two guinea pigs I saw back at the warehouse, they part of your team?"

"Yes, plus one more, Hurley."

Ven paused for a moment, "Wait, who?"

"Hurley."

Ven looked off to the side for a moment, "Hurley? I've heard that name before."

The thought was disrupted with a warm feeling coming from Ven's feet. He looks down and sees a small pool of blood gathering around the area. Darwin was loosing blood fast, and knew he was going to die within minutes if it wasn't controlled.

Ven pulls the gun away, "Look, if you want to survive, tell me who Hurley is."

"He's a guinea pig I met a few days ago."

"Where?"

"In a pet shop."

Ven pauses for a moment, thinking hard. "A pet shop.." He suddenly has a flashback, and remembers the conversation he had with Elliot.

A voice rang in Ven's head, it's Elliot, _"I never told you this but, besides Lillie, you had two more siblings."_

 _"Siblings?"_

 _ _"Brothers...__

 _"What happened to them?" asked Ven._

 _"On the night you were born, there was a fire in the pet shop. No one was there to put it out, so it destroyed everything, including the tank we were in..._

 _"Did they have names?" said Ven._

 _"Only one," said Elliot. "Hurley."_

 _"Hurley?"_

 _"You're father named him..."_

 _"Why not the other?" said Ven._

 _"He was the runt, and Marlen said that we shouldn't name him so that we wouldn't get too attached."_

 _"So you abandoned him?"_

 _"I didn't want to abandon him, but..." She pauses, then sighs subtlety. "You know, you and the runt were twins.."_

Ven trembles, "Hurley.. He's my..." He looks directly into Darwin's eyes, "And you?.."

"What?", said Darwin.

Ven glares at the pistol, and takes a step back, seeing the devastation he caused. His breathing gets heavy from a realization.

Darwin questions, "Your brother? Are we even talking about the same pig."

Ven attempts to compose himself, and re-focuses on reality, "Uh.. Yes, we're talking about the same one." Ven quickly holsters the gun and questions Darwin, "Did you know your mother?"

"What? My mother?"

"Please, answer the question."

"Uh- no, actually, I was givin up at birth."

"Figured as much." Ven turns towards the buggy and approaches it.

"I'm confused, what are you gettin at?" said Darwin.

Ven prepares the buggy for departure, then looks over at Darwin, "You're.. My brother, too."


	19. Early Scheduling

Chapter 19: Early Scheduling

Darwin sits in silence as he watches Ven dig around in the buggy. Darwin looks down at the wound, oozing blood. He begins to feel weak, and cold. But the pain was distracted by his curiousity of Ven.

He looks back up in doubt, "Brother, huh? Another one?.." Darwin studied Ven, "He looks like me, but.." His eyes scan down Ven's back, and spots a small discolored spot of fur near the bottom, a birthmark.

"Oh great.." whispered Darwin.

Ven finally got to some bandages, and turns to Darwin, rushing to apply them.

Darwin looks at Ven, "So you know my mother?"

"Of course."

"Does she also have that birthmark?"

Ven glances into Darwin's eyes, "Birthmark?"

"On your back."

"Ven turns around and spots the mark Darwin was talking about, "Yeah.. she does."

"Is she nice?"

Ven smiles, "You'll meet her.."

"Wait, what?"

Ven finishes wrapping the bullet wound, and stands up, "We're going home."

He reaches out to Darwin and lifts him up, carrying him to the buggy.

"I'm confused," said Darwin. "Where is.. home? And how do you know Hurley?"

"I'll answer all that on the way. Right now, conserve your energy."

Ven loads Darwin into the buggy, buckling him in. He looks down at the wound. It appears red, as the blood starts to seep through. Ven knows he doesn't have much time, and rushes to the drivers seat. He turns on the vehicle and floors it towards the village.

 ** _Alexei's house_**

The two girls approach Alexei's home, lights were on inside. The two girls, Jill and Beth, were the younger females of the village. Jill was a agouti tricolor with a blaze of white running through her face. She was known for not being pushed around, and was a real smooth talker. Beth was the shorter of the two, and slightly younger at just about a year and a half. She's a chubbier, black and white tricolor with a blaze of white also running down her face. She has a much more sensitive personality, and a mellow heart. Both girls really didn't like being in too much danger, but due to the circumstances, they were forced to do this.

Jill looks back at Beth, and hesitates to knock on the door. She gives a shallow breath, and knocks. Footsteps inside as it got closer, and the two girls get next to one another. The door opens wide and there stands Alexei, quiet and curious.

"Hey there!" said Jill with a suprising amount of confidence. "I heard you're the guy that's gonna get the bad people who destroyed the village."

Alexei looks Jill in the eye, and glances in the back were Beth was standing, looking slightly nervous.

Alexei responds, "I'm the one, yes.. Who are you?"

"My name's Jill, and this is Beth." She looks back at the young girl, who's having a hard time getting into character.

"We like men who can take charge like you," said Jill.

"Oh do you?" asked Alexei in a amorous tone. He looks at Beth once again, "Why does she look so nervous?"

Jill opens her eyes and quickly thinks of an answer, "I-I'm sorry, it's her first time."

Beth smiles, but doesn't give too much eye contact.

"First time huh?" said Alexei, "Well I can fix that.."

Jill flares up and gets closer to Alexei, softly poking his chest, "We came over to show you our appreciation."

Alexei gently rubs Jill's fur and gets a bit of goosebumps, it's softeness causes his hair to stand.

"Come in," remarked Alexei.

Jill and Beth slowly walk inside and begin to grope on Alexei, they shut the door, and the lights dim.

 _ **A few hours later**_

The morning light begins to shed the sky as dawn approaches. It's very calm and cool, no wind and barely a cloud to be seen. A small sound is heard, a vehicle. It approaches Alexei's home at blazing speeds. It's Ven, returning from the two day trip, and with him is Darwin. They arrive about six hours ahead of schedule.

Ven stops the vehicle in front of Alexei's home, he turns to Darwin. Darwin was no longer clearly answering questions and now appeared to be asleep. The bandages were soaked in blood and were dripping off into the vehicle. Ven knew Darwin was about to go into shock if medical care wasn't administered soon. He turns to Alexei's house; loud music rang in the house, drowning out the sound of the buggy.

"He's still awake?" whispered Ven to himself.

He turns off the vehicle and gets out, quickly getting on the other side to unbuckle Darwin. He awakes, only to mumble out gibberish, non comprehendable words.

"Stay with me," said Ven as he pulls Darwin out of the buggy.

The weakened body falls onto the floor, and Darwin groans in pain. Ven comes up and lifts Darwin up to shoulder level, limping across the grass towards the tree. Ven then peacefully sets him down against the bark, Darwin opens his eyes and looks around.

He spots the village in the distance, "I-Is this your home?" said Darwin in a very shaky tone.

"I'll be back," remarked Ven. "You're going to be alright."

Darwin turns slowly to Alexei's house, "T-That's a n-nice home.."

Ven stands up and looks at his hands, covered in blood. He couldn't bare to see Darwin, his brother, in this shape. Even after just a few hours riding back with him, Ven knew way more about his family and began to grow a connection. He lost his sister and is not prepared to lose another. Ven balls up his fist and turns to Alexei's house, darting across the field to the front porch.

The loud music overpowered the wood creeking of the porch.

"What is he doing?" wondered Ven.

He suddenly hears giggling, and wierd noises coming from the house. Unprovoked, Ven barges inside and spots Alexei. He was on the couch, laying on top of another guinea pig.

"WOAH! VEN!" shouted Alexei, startled by the door slam. The guinea pig scurries off the couch, "What the fuck!? What are you-, what time is it!?"

"You know," said Ven. "I sometimes sleep on that couch."

Jill and Beth stare at Ven, and the blood on his hands. They cower back towards the kitchen.

Alexei grabs the watch on the table, it says '0606'.

"Six in the morning?!" shouted the russian pig. "Six hours early!"

"Did I interrupt something important?" asked Ven.

"YES!" Alexei looks to Jill and Beth, "Ladies, do you mind giving us a moment?"

The girls don't say a single word, and dart out through the back door.

Alexei glares at Ven for a few seconds, seeing the blood on Ven's hands.

He sighs, "What the fuck happened?" The voice was low and gruff, hiding the inner rage that was inside.

"I found him," said Ven.

"The enemy?"

"Yes."

"And?"

"I- uh.. need your help."

Alexei squints, giving a peculiar curious look, "Where is he..?"

He walks outside onto the porch, searching for the guinea pig.

He soon finds him laying on the tree, "Hmm, so whats his name?" asked Alexei.

"Darwin."

Alexei studies him closer, spotting the bloodied bandages. "His leg... You shot him didnt you?

"Listen," spurted Ven. "We need to take him to the doc."

"Why?.. You wanted this, I'm surprised you didn't finish him off."

"I can't.. He's my brother.."

"Brother?"

"It's a long story.." Ven leans on the porch railing looking at Darwin, "But right now, you're gonna have to trust me."

Alexei pauses for a moment, then slowly turns around heading back indoors, in denial, Ven follows.

"I trust you," explained Alexei. "But _he_ is a different story." He points to the direction Darwin was laying. "Just because he looks like you doesn't mean anything."

"Like I said, it's a long story. You're just gonna have to believe me."

"Believe..?" Alexei walks right up next to Ven, looking him eye to eye. "I _believe_ you're failing me right now. Go.. and finish your mission."

He turns his back to Ven, expecting authority.

Ven resists, "No, I wont."

Alexei turns back at Ven with disappointment, then looks down at pistol, "Fine, I'll kill him myself."

"No, he's not our enemy."

Alexei doesnt speak, waiting for an explanation.

Ven continues, "Remember that mole we saw on the TV? He said that mole was in charge of clusterstorm. Darwin works for the government, he was there to stop it.

"You're going off of what he said, it's a lie."

"Trust me, I would've finished him long ago if I didnt believe him."

"Ven, you shouldn't even be talking to the enemy, otherwise they can start distracting you, decepting you into letting them live.

"Don't start this bullshit Alexei, Darwin wouldn't do that."

Alexei points to Ven, "You've grown attached to this pig.. Just because he's your 'brother'. You shift the blame elsewhere. But it's all lies, the brother, the clusterstorm..." Alexei sighs, "Let me guess, he told you all of this after you shot him?

Ven hesitates, "..Yes, but-"

"Exactly, he's trying to survive by tricking you to believing what he was saying."

"Alexei, I'm not that guillable."

"Apparently you are, give me the gun."

"I'm not letting you shoot him."

Alexei spoke in a demeaning soft voice, _"Give me that pistol.."_

"Sorry Alexei, I won't."

Alexei approaches Ven, walking up to him in a calm demeanor. Ven notices the stance and prepares himself. Alexei quickly tries snatching at the holster, but gets blocked by Ven's arm. Alexei anticipates the movement and counters it with a swift punch to the gut. The blow knocks the wind out of Ven, putting him on his knees. Alexei then swiftly snatches the pistol out of the holster.

He laughs, "You try and fight your teacher, old friend. Still have a lot to learn."

Alexei walks to the front door, watching Ven cough on the ground. He opens the door, spotting Darwin in the distance, then turns back around to Ven, "You're weak to believe the enemies saying, as they will say anything to live."

Alexei shuts the door, leaving Ven alone indoors.


	20. Two Birds, One Stone

Chapter 20: Two birds, One stone

 ** _The Village_**

Jill and Beth both sprinted back to the village in fear of their lives. The lead guinea pig spots them and waves them down.

"Over here!" shouted Hugo.

The two girls follow him to Ellis's home, rushing indoors. Ellis, Tibbetts, as well as a few guinea pigs who couldn't sleep throughout the night gathered in the home. The rest of the village overhears and awakes, curious of what happened.

"Are you two alright?" asked Hugo. "What happened?"

"Is Alexei gonna help us?" asked Ellis.

Jill hesitated for a second, "Ven returned.."

"He's back?" asked Tibbetts. "Did you see someone else with him?"

"No, but he had blood on his hands."

"Blood..?"

Hugo jumps in, "Alright, we need to know exactly what happened."

"...Okay."

Jill sits down, and Beth continues to be silent, staring at the ground.

"E-Everything was fine," said Jill. "Alexei was in a good mood, having fun, then suddenly.. Ven opens the front door, and Alexei freaks out. He had blood on his hands, and looked menacing. Then Alexei told us to leave.."

"But did you manage to get anything out of him?" spurted Ellis.

"Uh.. No.."

Everyone sighs in disappointment, looking at each other.

"Now what?" asked one guinea pig.

"Well, I have one last idea," said Hugo. "But everyone is has to be aboard for it to work."

"What?" said Ellis.

"If we all gather up, we can overwhelm Ven and Alexei. Take the gun, and force him to help us build, or else."

Ellis steps up, "That sound like a terrible idea, you're risking the lifes of everyone doing that. We barely have enough people as is."

"Well, then I have failed you as a leader."

Tibbetts walks up, "Have you guys even tried to simply ask?"

Hugo looks up, "Tibbetts.. It's not that simple."

"Maybe it is, It won't hurt."

"No Tibbetts, sit down."

Tibbets surveys the room, seeing the hopelessness in everyones eyes. "W-What? You given up.. Fine, well I'll go ask then."

Tibbetts begins to march towards the front door.

Hugo halts him, "Tibbetts don't, I can't take another loss."

"Let him," inturrupted Ellis. "We're better off without him anyway. One less mouth to feed."

"Ellis stop that! If we lose Tibbetts, we lose any chance of getting Alexei to help us. Lets keep a good reputation."

Tibbetts thinks for a second, "No.. If we wait any longer, we won't survive another week! I'm asking now.."

Hugo stomps the ground, "You're not going!"

"Stop me then!"

Tibbetts rushes out the front door before anyone grabs him, and runs away from the home.

"We have to stop him!" shouted Hugo.

"It's too late," spoke Ellis in a bitter voice.

Hugo balls his fist, and looks around. Everyone had eyes on him, waiting for their leader to make a wise decision. He closes his eyes, "I'm not letting the future of the village be decided by a rebellious kid, I'm going after him."

The lead pig advances out the door, everyone moving aside. Once outside, he peers into the distance, at Alexei's home.

Ellis sighs, then follows, as well as the rest of the village.

 ** _Alexei's home_**

Ven gathers his breath and gets up, dazed from the punch. He slowly walks forward towards the window, staggering on each step. Approaching the window, Ven peeks outside, seeing Alexei walk towards Darwin with the pistol in his hand. he begins to breath heavily, looking around with desperation, searching for a solution.

Alexei approaches Darwin, standing a few steps away. Darwin looks in hope that this guy is going to help him.

Alexei checks the chamber of the pistol, "..Darwin, right?"

Darwin doesn't answer, instead just lifts his head to rest on the tree behind him.

"You look in pretty bad shape."

Alexei walks up to Darwin, kneeling down next to him. Darwin looks Alexei in the eye, wheezing.

"Hmm, you really do look like Ven," said Alexei. He pauses, then swiftly punches Darwin in the face, "But brother? Meh.."

The punch knocks him off the tree, and Darwin squeals.

Alexei gets up and circles back in front, "You may be able to trick Ven, but not me."

Darwin spits, "W-What are you talking about?"

"Ahh, you see, I'm the one asking questions." Alexei points the gun, "You're in charge of clusterstorm?"

"W-why does everyone here think that, no!"

Alexei begins to pull on the trigger, but suddenly gets halted. A door opens, and Alexei turns around, it's Ven.

"Stop this, Alexei!"

"Eh, fuck off."

Ven rushes down the steps, then towards Alexei. Alexei aims the gun at Ven, stopping him in his tracks.

Alexei re-aims the pistol at Darwin, "So, if you didn't cause it, who did?"

Darwin struggles, "S-Speckles."

"That's the mole I keep hearin about?"

"...Ye-s." The guinea pig is dazed and bleeding out, loosing the ability speak clearly. Ven attempts to move towards Darwin to assist. Immediatly Alexei fires a round towards Ven's feet, missing by mere inches.

Alexei continues, "Tell me.."

"H-he.."

Darwin starts to fade into a shock state, eyes glossy. Ven starts to break as sees yet another sibling die in front of his eyes, caused by his own bullet.

"It is funny," said Alexei. He turns to Ven, "You shot him, yet now you're trying to save him." Alexei studies Ven, seeing the dread in his eyes. "Weakness.. Well, you brought this among yourself."

Ven shifts his eyes back on Darwin, soon to be another death added to the family. A feeling of lonliness and despair took over his emotions. Darwin slowly opens his eyes, bloodshot in death, and glares at Ven. The desperation overwhelms him and he clicks..

No thought in it, Ven storms Alexei, prepared to fight till the last breath. Alexei reacts and points the gun towards Ven, shooting him. The round pierces through Ven's leg, but this doesn't stop him. Ven tackles Alexei to the ground, rolling around trying to gain control of the weapon.

The noise they gathered gains everyone's attention in the village. Ellis and his group hears the gunfire, and drop down on the ground.

"You think he just shot Tibbetts?" asked a guinea pig.

"This is suicide!" said another.

Ellis pauses, looking towards Alexei's home.

Meanwhile, from the sideline and out of sight, was Tibbetts, watching from a safe distance.

Hugo approaches from behind, "Tibbetts! What's happening?"

"Shhh! Get down."

Hugo drops, then crawls up. He spots Ven and Alexei on the ground fighting, rolling on top of one another.

Blood from Ven's wound begins to rub all over Alexei's fur as he struggles to maintain control of the weapon. Alexei then elbows Ven's gut, and rolls on top of his belly in a way where Ven starts to suffocate. The weapon is in Alexei's right hand, but Ven has his finger on the trigger. The gun fires into the air, and the recoil brings the weapon on top of both of them. Ven attempts to take control of the makarov and forces the barrel to aim at Alexei and himself. He contemplates if he shoots the gun, the round will go through Alexei and into himself. Alexei knows his strength isn't as strong as it used to be and can't aim the pistol elsewhere.

"Ven," struggled Alexei. "Don't let it end like this."

No though in it, two rounds are fired through Alexei and into Ven. Alexei shrieks in pain and rolls off Ven. Ven immediatly gains control of the pistol, kicks himself off of Alexei and fires four more rounds into Alexei's back and head, emptying the magazine. A gurgle came out of Alexei, as well as blood dripping from his skull, then silence.

Ven stares at the gun, and the body in front of him. He pauses for a second, and looks up in the sky, closing his eyes. He wonder if in the future, he will ever regret the choices he just made. Re-shaping his life, and killing the past. He looks back down and re opens his eyes, watery. Ven drops the pistol, and attempts to move, but gets stopped by a pain in his gut. He places his hand onto his stomach, blood oozing out. Ven sighs and lies on his back, passing out.


	21. Stones Don't Break Easily

Chapter 21: Stones Don't Break Easily

The sun is almost fully up, and the wind began to pick up, rustling the trees around. Tibbett's and the lead guinea pig peek out and see the remains. Tibbetts looks left at the lead pig.

"Did they just..?" said Tibbetts, pointing at Alexei and Ven.

"Yeah.. looks like it." answered Hugo.

Tibbetts stands up over the ledge, and approaches the bodies. He looks upon Alexei and Ven, then sighs, putting his hands on his hips.

"Tibbetts!" shouted a voice from behind.

Tibbetts turns around, it's Ellis.

"You're alive." said Ellis.

"Uhh.. Yeah, I am."

Ellis, as well as the rest of the village approach the dead guinea pigs. Some told their young to leave.

"What happened here?" asked Ellis.

"I don't know," answered Tibbetts. "They.. Were involved in a quarrel or something."

"Well, two crazies with a gun never amounts to anything good." He pauses, "But this.. _is_ good. We don't have to worry about them anymore."

Tibbetts turns sharply at Ellis, "What? What did you just say?"

"I said we don't have to worry about them anymore, they were problematic to begin with."

"You don't care?" Tibbetts balls his fist.

Suddenly a voice in the distance, "Hey doc!"

Ellis looks to see who's calling him, it's a guinea pig near the tree. "Come over here!"

Ellis rushes to the tree, with Tibbetts following. On the ground next to the tree, layed Darwin, still alive.

"What the.." said Ellis in shock of what he sees before him.

"We found him, lying here," said the pig.

Tibbetts catches up, as well as the rest of the village.

Ellis kneels down next to the bleeding pig and checks his wound. He puts his hand in front of Darwin's nose.

"He's still breathing," said Ellis. "Hey, are you with me? What's your name?"

No response. Ellis moves closer, and opens Darwin's eye lids. They were about rolled back, and glossy. Suddenly Darwin starts shaking, cold from the lost blood.

"He's fainted," said Ellis. "And about to go into shock."

Tibbetts steps up, "That's the guy."

Everyone turns.

"The guy?" spoke Ellis.

"From the TV."

Ellis turns back to Darwin, "Him!?"

"Yeah.. Ven said he would return with the one who caused the destruction of the village."

Ellis takes a second to comprehend, "Holy shit.. So he's the one behind all this."

"Then why are we tending him," shouted a guinea pig in the crowd. "He deserves to die!"

"No!" spurted Tibbetts. "I think Ven was trying to protect this guy."

"How do you know?" said Ellis.

"I was watching from the side. Alexei and Ven were arguing about killing him I think, then they attacked each other.

"That doesn't make any sense."

"I'm still trying to wrap my head around it myself."

"But why protect him?" spurted a guinea pig in the crowd. "After all that happened? That can't be true!"

"Well," said Ellis. "If anyone knows the answer, its him. Take him to the house, hurry!"

A few pigs gather and lift Darwin up, heading towards Ellis's house.

"Doc!?" shouted the same pig in the crowd.

"I don't wanna hear it. My job is to save people, not let them die!"

Tibbetts rolls his eyes, "Now you act heroic..."

"Shut it Tibbetts!" He points at Darwin. "He's the only one that can tell us what happened, not you."

Ellis begins to walk away.

"What about Ven?" asked Tibbetts.

Ellis stops, "What about Ven?"

"You're not gonna ask him?"

Ellis turns around, eyes squinted, "They're dead.."

"How do you know?"

"How do I know!? Holy shit Tibbetts.. Here lemme ask them." Ellis projects his voice towards the two guinea pigs in the grass. "HEY VEN! WERE YOU PROTECTING THIS GUY!?" Ellis places his hand near his ear to listen for a responce, "Yeah, I didn't think so."

Ellis turns his back to Tibbetts and steps away once more.

"I mean go and check."

"There's literally no point."

"So you're just gonna leave them?"

"No, we'll come back to give a proper burial."

Tibbetts crosses his arms, "Pfft, wow. A piece of shit doctor you are."

"You're wasting my time, Tibbetts." Ellis begins to walk out of sight, "Hey, didn't you want to be a doctor? Look, there's your opportunity..."

Ellis's voice fades in the distance as Tibbetts watches in disappointment. He then turns to Alexei and Ven, and approaches them once more.

The two guinea pigs lay, lifeless on the grass. Alexei had a pool of blood around him, it was clear his demise was ture. Ven was a foot away, and didn't look as bad; blood dripping from his chest and back. Tibbetts moved closer to Ven, kneeling beside him. He looks upon the body, then places his hand in front of Ven's face to check for breathing. No signs of life came from the corpse. Tibbetts moves his hand away and spots the pistol, the culprit of this disaster. He attempts to reach over Ven to grab the weapon but slips atop of Ven, getting blood on his fur. He immediatly pushes himself off and rubs the blood off, disgusted from the sight. A twitch came from the body and more blood poured out. Then, suddenly a wheezing sound is heard.

Tibbetts listens in and investigates, "Ven?"

No answer came from the body, but a continued wheezing was heard. Tibbetts replaces his hand in front of Ven's nose and mouth and feels a slight breeze.

"He.. He's alive, he has to be!"

Tibbetts peaks over towards the village, looking directly at Ellis's home. He ponders if he should even tell the village.

"If I take him to Ellis.." thought Tibbetts to himself. "He'll probably die. Ellis's lack of care is a concern."

He looks back at Ven, "Don't worry, you're gonna be okay."

 ** _Meanwhile, at Ellis's home_**

The guinea pigs lay Darwin on the table, and begin to recover the broken pig. Ellis removes the bloodied bandage on his leg and studies the wound.

"Looks like shrapnel," said Ellis. He studies it closer, "From a projectile."

"Probably a bullet," said another pig. "Look, it went all the way through."

Ellis turns the leg around, "I see.. Grab me some suture." The other guinea pig hands Ellis what looks like nylon threads. "We need to stop the bleeding before anything else."

Ellis grabs the nylon thread and wraps it around Darwin's leg, tightly. After a few seconds, the bloodflow had stopped, and Ellis begins to stitch the wound with the rest of the nylon. He points around, giving various orders.

"You," shouted Ellis, pointing at a pig in the back. "Get me the syringe from the breeders home." He points at another pig. "And you, please grab some pain reliever pills and grind them up."

An hour passes, and Ellis successfully stitches the wound. He continues to clean up the blood from the local area, then cleans his own hands. The other look upon Darwin, resting on the table.

"He lost a lot of blood," said Ellis. "But he'll make it."

"Him and Ven," said a guinea pig. "The similarities are striking.. This is the guy from the news station?"

"It is," answered Ellis.

"They're practically the same pig, could make a good replacer."

"I don't know about that. Remember, this is the guy behind the village attack."

"Then why are we helping him?"

"I'm still asking myself that question." They look back at Darwin. "According to Tibbetts, Ven was trying to protect this guy."

"And you believed him?"

"I don't want to.."

"Then how do you know it's true?"

"I don't. But if anyone knows the answer, it's him." Ellis points at Darwin.

"Still, it seems off that Ven would protect the one that destroyed the village."

"Yeah..."

A gruff voice appears, "He's a friend."

"Hugo?" wondered Ellis.

Hugo shows himself in the room. "Ven had good intentions. He wouldn't do this unless there was reason."

"We'll see."

"I trusted Ven's judgement, don't worry."

The other guinea pig intervenes, "About Ven, who's gonna tell his mother the news? And are we gonna keep this pig here until he recovers?"

Ellis sighs, "I have to head out and recover Ven and Alexei, as well as prepare a grave for them. So, I'll let you figure that out, I'm not gonna be the bearer of bad news.. again."

"Do you need help?" asked the guinea pig.

"I can use a couple bodies."

 ** _At Alexei's house_**

Ellis arrives at the home with two guinea pigs for help. They look around for Alexei, and spot him near the tree. They approach Alexei, but pause suddenly.

"Wait," said Ellis. "Where's Ven!?"

The guinea pig had disappeared, leaving only a trace of blood on the ground. The other two guinea pigs begin to look around for the missing pig.

"Also, where's the weapon!?" one of the pigs asked.

"Maybe he's alive?" said the other guinea pig. "He is a tough motherfucker."

"Or someone took him.."

Ellis stares blankly into the spot were Ven was resting, "Who the hell would take a dead body? Wait.."

"Hey, wasn't Tibbetts here earlier?" asked one of the pigs.

Ellis looks to the group, "Exactly my thought, let's go.."

They begin to rush over towards Tibbetts' home, leaving Alexei for later.

 ** _At Tibbetts' house_**

Ven was on a table near the back of the living room, still bleeding. Tibbetts studied Ven, looking at the bullet holes.

"It doesn't look like anything vital," said Tibbetts to himself. "I mean-"

Suddenly a knock. Tibbetts peeks towards the door. He knows exactly who it is, then sighs. Tibbetts approaches the door, and opens it. Standing in front, was Ellis. Behind him stands the other two guinea pigs,

"Okay, where is he?" said Ellis.

"Who?" answered Tibbetts.

"Cut the shit, I know you have Ven."

"What makes you think that?"

"I don't know Tibbetts.. When I try to bury a couple of dead bodies and see one of them missing I think.. Damn. What mental psychopath takes dead people? Oh I know one! You Tibbetts..."

"I didn't take Ven."

"You're a terrible liar." Ellis attempts to enter the home. "I know you have Ven."

The door suddenly gets stopped by Tibbetts' foot, blocking Ellis's entrance. Although, he manages to spot Ven on a table on the other side of the living room.

"Aha!" shouted Ellis.

"Leave." said Tibbetts in a forboding tone. He pushes Ellis back outside.

"What the actual fuck are you doing with a dead body Tibbetts?"

Tibbetts gave a stern, but sarcastic look to Ellis, "He's alive, just like you said."

"Alive? Bullshit."

"Just like the guy standing at my doorstep."

"Can I go one day, without hearing your shit?"

"Short answer, no."

"Wow." Ellis smirks. "You are one jealous bitch."

"I'm not jealous of someone that isn't real."

The smirk wipes off Ellis's face, and he peers into Tibbetts' eyes. "Okay, why are you doing this? Is it to cheer up your worthless life?"

"Yes, exactly."

Ellis sighs, giving up on trying to antagonize Tibbetts. "Why didn't you bring Ven to me?"

"It's none of your concern."

"It _is_ my concern." Ellis looks over to Ven once more, attemping to enter the home. "Move."

"No!" Tibbetts shoves his foot in front of the door. "Anything you do now will kill him."

Ellis raises an eyebrow, "What are you talking about, I'm trying to help."

"And I deny that help, Ven is under my care."

"You're not a doctor, Tibbetts."

"And you are?"

"I literally just went through a surgery.."

"Well," remarked Tibbetts. "I wouldn't worry about Ven, not like you ever did."

Ellis tightens his fist, " _I'm taking Ven.._ " The other pigs step up.

"No you're not." Tibbetts reveals the pistol he's been hiding behind his back. Ellis and the others immediatly recess back. "I'm tired of dealing with people like you, pushing me aside because they feel obligated to do so.."

He continues, "Ven is in a condition where simple stitching won't do it. I've read numorous books on the subject of medicine, and saved Ven's mother from death. Hell, I'm the one who told you how to take care of her, and you dare insult my ability?"

Ellis shrugs in fear, "Tibbetts-"

"And you!? You call yourself a doctor? Do you know how many people died that night because you didn't know how to properly administer treatment!? People bled out, because of you. I wanted to help, but I couldn't, because of you. Ven was gonna to die if it was up to you.. And you wouldn't have given a damn, because he was a burden to you. Ven protects this village, but to you, he's just another 'death'. A number.. A statistic. No, it should of been you on the ground over there!" Tibbetts raises the pistol. "In fact, that can still happen, so leave before it does."

Ellis slowly responds, "So you're going to shoot me if I help Ven?"

"If you, 'help' Ven, he will die. You don't have the knowledge much less the care to deal with him." Tibbetts points the pistol at Ellis, " _Sorry doc, this is my patient_."

Ellis slowly backs up, hands raised. "Fine, I'll leave.."

Tibbetts lowers the guns and watches the three pigs walk away.

Suddenly Ellis turns his head around, "When he dies though, you can only blame yourself."

Tibbetts doesn't respond, instead shuts the door and controls his breathing. He places the pistol onto the couch, then looks over towards Ven.

"I'm not planning on him leaving just yet," chatted Tibbetts to himself.

 ** _Ellis's home_**

Ellis and his helpers return, nothing in hand. They get spotted by the guinea pigs inside the home. As they walk inside, other surround them in curiosity.

"Your finished?" asked a guinea pig.

"No," answered Ellis. "We had a bit of a snag.. Well more than a bit."

"What happened?"

Ellis pauses, looking upon the group, "I don't want anyone near Tibbetts.. He.. has a gun."

"How?" asked Hugo.

"He took it from Ven.. He also has Ven."

Everyone's heads turn, "Explain, please."

"Apparently Ven is alive, and is under Tibbetts' care."

"Ven's alive!?" interrupted Hugo."

"Yeah, but Tibbetts doesn't want us near him, threatening us with the weapon. I told him if Ven dies, he would be the only one to blame."

"What?" Hugo looks off to the side. "This doesn't make any sense."

Ellis turns towards Darwin, "Besides that, has anyone made a decision on where to keep him at?" He points at Darwin.

One of the pigs answered, "We agreed for him to stay at Ven's."

"Ven's house? We're not trying to replace him."

"Well then let's keep him here, in your house."

"What? Hell no, put him at your house."

"How 'bout no. He's your problem, not ours."

Ellis's expression depresses, "Fair enough.. We have to get Elliot's permission though."

"I'm pretty sure she'll agree, being that you have to check her daily anyway, and they're both immobilized."

"Sounds good." Ellis points out to his helpers, "Grab him, lets's go."

Before leaving the house, Ellis gets stopped by Hugo, "Ellis!"

Ellis turns around.

"If Tibbetts has Ven, where's Alexei?"

"He's still at his house."

"You didn't bury him?"

"No, if Tibbetts wants to desecrate bodies, he can do it."

"And if he doesn't?"

"Well, then Alexei rots."

Ellis doesn't give Hugo another chance to ask a question, and shuts the front door.

Ellis and a few guinea pigs arrive at Elliot's front door, looking at each other, before entering.


	22. Family Of Guinea Pigs

Chapter 22: Family of Guinea Pigs

Ellis opens the front door and sees Elliot lying on her cot, looking worrisome.

"Doc," said Elliot. Her voice was rough, still recovering from the accident.

She continues, "I heard some noise outside a couple of hours ago, from Alexei's. Is Ven okay?"

"You don't know?" asked Ellis.

"Know what?"

Ellis turned his head, peering outside towards his helpers. His eyes squint in disappointment that he will have to once again be the bearer of bad news.

"Doc," said Elliot. "What happened?"

Ellis sighs, "There.. Was a fight."

"Between who?"

"Ven.. And Alexei..."

"No, stop." She lies back down and stares at the roof for a moment.

"Elliot?"

"I recognized those sounds, it was Alexei's pistol."

Ellis pauses, "I'm sorry Elliot.."

"So Ven is..?"

Ellis perks up, "No, he's apparently alive."

Elliot shoots back up, peering into Ellis's eyes, shocked, as well as being curious.

Ellis continues, "But he's being treated by.. Tibbetts."

"Tibbetts!?" The mere saying of the name disgusted Elliot. "That unstable mental psychopath! He's taking care of Ven!? Get him out of there!"

"I've tried.. He's got Alexei's gun, saying that I will kill Ven if I tried to help."

"That _YOU_ will kill Ven?"

"I really have have no idea.." Ellis turns back towards outside, peeking at Darwin. "I also can't say if Ven is gonna make it, but that's not why were here."

"Then what?"

"There's a guinea pig that we want to keep here to recover. Ven risked his life to protect him and we think he'll be safe here."

"Who is he?"

"This is the guy we saw on the TV that Ven was after. He looks awful a lot like Ven. But for some reason, Ven was protecting him, so we thought he was a friend, and gave him medical attention. Now we need a place for him to recover."

Elliot's expression angered, "So you're bringing the very guy that caused my family's destruction, to my home for recovery..."

"Ven was protecting this individual. For that reason, we're gonna assume he's friendly.." Ellis takes a step closer to Elliot, "Can we keep him here?"  
Elliot thinks for a moment, "Let me see him."

Ellis turns around and gestures to the guys holding Darwin, instructing them to come inside. Elliot takes a look at the bruised face and damaged body, and instantly showed disbelief and confusion.

"Oh.. Uh.." said Elliot. "He does look like Ven." Her eyes track onto the broken guinea pig as he's carried across the living room. "That's.. Overwhelming.."

"So can he stay?" Ellis looked desperate.

Elliot appeared to be in a trance. She get's a feeling inside, a connection to the guinea pig.

Elliot snaps back into reality, "U-Uh fine, but don't let him get near me!"

"Don't worry," said Ellis. "He's temporarily immobilized due to the wound on his leg."

Elliot watched as the two guinea pigs lay Darwin onto another cot.

She wondered to herself, "Friendly huh? Why would Ven protect the one thing that killed his family? I wonder what his name is..."

"Alright," remarked Elliot. "I'm gonna come back in a few hours to see how he's doing."

Elliot nods, still staring at Darwin.

"I'll bring lunch for you soon, bye."

Ellis shuts the front door, and the guinea pigs begin to walk away, footsteps fading. Elliot continued to glare at Darwin, curious to know more about the guinea pig. Being paralyzed, she can't walk towards him, only turn her neck over to see him.

 ** _Tibbetts' house_**

Meanwhile, Tibbetts prepares for surgery onto Ven. He hooks up a plastic bag, of what looks like a clear liquid. On it, he marked "IV". The bag had a small tube at the bottom leading towards a needle, which was placed into Ven's arm. He was lying upright on a table, near the back of Tibbetts' living room.

"The bullets didn't go all the way through.." concluded Tibbetts.

He begins to wipe up the blood near the wounds.

"One... Two.. Three.." Tibbetts counted the rounds fired into Ven. Two in the gut, and one in the leg.

Tibbetts raised the leg up, "Looks like the round went all the way through in this one." He inspects the other two bullet wounds. "These don't look nearly as bad.."

He takes a closer look, then slowly places his fingers into the wound. Suddenly Tibbetts feels something hard, and jagged.

"The bullet! It's still there!" He takes out his fingers and wipes off the blood. "You're lucky, Ven. Alexei took the blunt force of those rounds.."

Tibbetts grabs a small pair of tweezers and begins to pull out the rounds, starting the surgery. It takes hours, finishing around late afternoon. Thanks to Tibbetts scavenging the medical supplies from the breeders home, he was able to find a way to give nutrition to Ven while he rests, gaining more blood cells.

 ** _Elliot's house_**

It's late afternoon, sky is partly cloudy and air is peaceful. Suddenly, inside of Elliot's house, Darwin awakes. He slowly opens his eyes, seeing Elliot in the cot nearest. She's facing him, eyes shut asleep. Darwin then rolls around and looks outside, seeing the remainder of the village. On the ground layed broken appliances, and in the distance, homes destroyed. Darwin's expression depresses, then rolls onto his back, attemping to sit up. Blood rushes to his head and a sharp pain came from his leg, causing him to immediatly lie back down, shrugging in pain. He wonders what happened to Ven, and why he's not here. He also wonders if his team is searching for him. As questions passed through his mind, he continued to look outside, studying the village, and it's members.

About an hour later, Elliot begins to awake. She rubs her eyes, and spots Darwin, looking out the window from his cot.

Darwin notices Elliot, not regarding her presence.

A few seconds pass, Darwin was the first to speak. "The doc came by and left some food for you."

Elliot rolled and saw the tray of seeds and stale bread, then turned back.

"What's your name?" asked Elliot.

"Darwin."

"Darwin?"

She glared at his back as he continued to look out the window.

"What happened to you?" said Darwin. He slowly turned and looked at Elliot, eye to eye.

"I was attacked.." responded Elliot. "By a- machine.. Red machine."

Darwin's expression changed, as if he knew exactly what she was talking about.

She continued, "It stormed the house, destroying the walls. The debris fell and hit my back, paralyzing me, then left me buried in the destruction."

"How did you survive?"

"My son came and buried me out. I was then taken to the doc's house, and brought back when they needed space."

Darwin raises his head, then turns to look out the window again.

"Yup," said Elliot. "And now I'm here looking at the guy who caused it all." Darwin sharply turned to Elliot. "After all the destruction you caused this village and my family, I'm surprised Ven didn't kill you."

"You know Ven?"

"He's my son."

"Your son!?"

"Yes.." Elliot pauses. "But not anymore, he's probably.." She turns away in anxiety.

Darwin doesn't respond.

A few more seconds pass as Elliot gathers her thoughts, "Do you know?" said Elliot. Darwin looks back at her as she turns back around. "Do you know why he sacrificed his life to save yours?"

Darwin hesitates, "U-Uh.. I'm his.. Brother, apparentely."

Elliot perks up, "Brother? I don't have any other young that aren't dead."

"He only said that because he knows another pig named Hurley."

"Hurley's alive!?"

"Oh, so you know him too..."

"Yes! Oh my god, he survived."

Darwin gets mind boggled, "Could you uh, explain?"

"Well.." Elliot spots a small photo of the village from two years ago. "Look at the picture on the table besides you."

Darwin turns and grabs the picture, studying it closely. There were about forty guinea pigs in the photo, inluding Elliot. Next to her, was a guinea pig who looked exactly like Hurley.

Darwin's eyes opened, "Whoa! Who is that next to you, is that Hurley?"

"That's his father."

Darwin was shocked, amazed by the new knowledge he had gained.

"So that's Hurley's dad," said Darwin. "So if me and Hurley are brothers.."

"I had four young," explained Elliot. "Three boys and one girl. There was a fire; we only made it out with two, Ven and his sister, Lillie. We left two behind."

"Let me guess, Hurley and myself.." Darwin pauses. "I was told that I'm the runt of the family, is that true?"

"Yes. You were smaller than the others, and weren't strong enough for feeding so.."

"Did I have a birth name?"

"Well, I guess 'the runt'. You were gonna die if you didn't get fed, I'm surprised you lived though, and Hurley. That puts me at ease."

Darwin looks as the photo again, "So I actually have two brothers, and sister? Where is she?"

"She.. She got murdered by that same red machine."

Darwin expression instantly changes and he puts the photo back, turning around at the window again. "My father?"

"I don't know. Haven't seen him since, probably suffered the same fate."

"I see," said Darwin. "It makes sense now, why you would be after us. Me and my team were actually trying to stop that from happening."

"Huh?"

"That machine you saw, it's called Clusterstorm. It was designed to be a weapon disguised as a regular appliance."

"Go on."

"I'm part of a team, called G-force. We went in to attack a guy named Saber, who was supposedly behind clusterstorm. But as it turns out, it was one of our own. By that time though, it was too late, and clusterstorm was already activated."

"Ven told me he saw someone on the TV who looked exactly like you."

"If it was on the news channel, then yes. We work for the FBI, so our mission is a secret. Any publicity would destroy our organization. The leaked footage almost did just that."

"So, if you were trying to stop it, why would Ven attack you?"

"He probably made the assumption because of the news footage, I can see how.. The actual bad guy, 'Speckles', is already in custody."

Elliot thinks for a moment, "So really this was just a waste of time."

Darwin looks out the window once more, seeing the appliances on the ground, "I'm.. Sorry."

Elliot smiles, "You know, I'm just happy I get to see my son again."

Suddenly the front door opens. It's Ellis, coming to check on his patients one last time before night. He walks in and notices Darwin awake.

"Hello," said Ellis. The voice seemed a bit nervous. "Are you a.. friend?"

Darwin turns his head, "I am, you the doc?"

Ellis pauses, "Yes, my name is Ellis. What's your name?"

"It's Darwin."

"I hope you know a lot of people here want answers, Darwin."

"I figured as much."

A group of guinea pigs appear behind Ellis. Darwin looks over towards Elliot, knowing it's about to be a long night.


	23. Reunion

Chapter 23: Reunion

 ** _The next morning_**

Tibbetts stands near the window, watching for anyone getting near the home. He glances over towards the pistol, ready to use it if anyone tries to enter the home. All of a sudden, the couch where Ven was resting, creeks. Tibbetts curiously turns around, seeing if Ven had awoken. Ven's eyes slowly open, and he attempts to sit up.

"Ven!" shouted Tibbetts.

Ven peeks over, "Tibbetts?"

Tibbetts rushes over and hugs Ven, tightly squeezing him, "You're okay!"

Ven attempts to resist the hug, but can't due to the lack of energy. He sighs, and accepts the hug.

"Where are we?" asked Ven.

"My house," answered Tibbetts. "I brought you here yesterday after.. well you know."

Ven looks around getting a hold of his surroundings. He suddenly remembers the battle with Alexei, and realizes that's it's been a whole day.

"Wait.." said Ven. "Where's Darwin?"

"Who?"

"Darwin, the other one who looks like me."

"You mean the guy from the TV? He got taken to Ellis's."

"So the doc got him?"

"Uh.. Yeah, I guess."

Ven exhales in relief, "Good.."

A few seconds pass, "How you feeling?" asked Tibbetts.

Ven looks down at himself, "Good, surprisingly."

"Can you stand?"

"I can try."

Ven prepares himself, then pushes himself off the couch.

"Ah!" shrieked Ven. The pain from his leg causes him to collapse back onto the couch.

"Hold on.." remarked Tibbetts.

He grabs a small stick from the corner of the room, and hands it to Ven.

"Here, use this to support yourself."

Ven places the stick on the ground, and once again pushes himself off the couch. He leans onto the stick, keeping the bad leg in the air.

"Look at you," said Tibbetts. "You've already recovered enough to move. That's impressive for someone who got shot three times."

Suddenly Ven gets dizzy, and sits back down. He looks down at his stomach, and spots the stitches, covered by bandages.

"You did this?" said Ven.

"Yeah, Alexei took the blunt force of the rounds. So they weren't traveling fast enough to go through you all the way." He looks Ven in the eye. "You're lucky, they didn't hit anything vital."

Ven ganders around the room, and spots the operating table, covered in blood.

"You need to eat," said Tibbetts.

He grabs a plate of seeds from another table across the room, Ven watches. Next to the plate, was Alexei's pistol. Ven glances at the pistol then rests his eyes onto it, knowing it's significance. Tibbetts returns and hands Ven the plate, but Ven was too focused on the makarov.

"Ven?" asked Tibbetts.

Ven snaps back into reality and accepts the plate of food, mind still focused on the pistol.

"Now," continued Tibbetts. "Since you're okay, I'm gonna get some rest.. Haven't slept all night. I suggest you do the same."

Ven looks at Tibbetts, nods, then returns his eyes onto the pistol. Tibbetts begins to walk upstairs, and out of sight.

Ven continues to stare at the weapon, wondering about Alexei. His friend, brother at arms, gone in a instant. Ven couldn't stay in the house, he has to pay his respects. He places the plate of food down next to him and gets up, wobbling over towards the pistol. He snatches it.

 ** _At Alexei's house_**

Ven stands above Alexei's remains, shadow casting over him. He looks upon Alexei for minutes, trying not to regret the decision he had made. Ven soon decides he needs to bury him, and looks over towards the house. He spots a shovel, and stumbles towards it.

Ven begins to dig a deep hole in the backyard of the house, near the edge of the drop-off. He drags Alexei and places him in the hole, covering it back up with dirt. He then places a few rocks rock around the area, circling the grave.

Ven hesitates to speak, but murmurs out a word. "Thanks."

He slowly gets up and turns around, looking at the village from afar. He now wonders about Darwin, and his safety. He begins to stumble back to the village.

 ** _In the Village_**

As Ven slowly ventures through the village, he gets spotted by Hugo.

"Uh, who is that?" shouted Hugo from his house.

Ven stops and turns to Hugo, giving him a peculiar look.

"V-Ven?" It doesn't take Hugo long to recognize the expression. "Oh my, Tibbetts you actually did it!"

He rushes outside and approaches Ven.

"Y-You're alive!" spurted Hugo.

"Where's Darwin?" asked Ven.

"You mean your brother?"

"What?.. How did you know that he was my brother?"

"He told us.. You must have a bunch of questions.. C'mon, Darwin's recovering with Elliot."

Hugo begins to assist Ven in walking towards his house.

"Is he alright?" asked Ven.

"He's fine.. Now. Although he can't really move."

"What about my mother?"

"She's fine as well."

The two guinea pigs arrive at Elliot's house and stop at the front door.

"You go on in," said Hugo. "They're your family.."

Ven smirks slightly and enters the house, shutting the door behind him. Inside, Darwin and Elliot lay eyes on Ven. No one says a word in disbelief, instead it goes into a sort of awkward stare down.

"Uh.. Hey," murmured Ven.

"Ven.." whispered Elliot, in a shaking voice. "You're.."

"Alive? Yeah, everyone seems surprised by that." He looks over to Darwin. "Hey, Darwin."

"Hi Ven," answered Darwin.

Darwin studies Ven, noticing the bullet wounds around Ven's body. He smirks, "Would you say this is karma?"

"I guess so."

"Hurts, doesn't it.."

"A little." Ven approaches Darwin, slowly kneeling besides him. "Look, Darwin..-

"You're about to apologize, don't."

"I shouldn't have brought you here."

"No, this was a good thing. Because of you, I now know my history. Where I came from.. My family. Really, I should be thanking you."

Elliot calls out to Ven, he turns. "Thanks for listening to me Ven, you've made me complete as well."

Everyone smiles, then the door opens from behind. It's some village members, with Tibbetts.

"Ven!" shouted a guinea pig.

"Yes, I'm alive," answered Ven.

"Ven, I told you to rest," said Tibbetts.

"I needed to make sure they were alright."

"Well, they're fine."

Hugo stepped up towards Ven, "Tibbetts told us everything, as well as Darwin."

"So is everything good now?" asked Ven.

"No, we still have to worry about the village, and rebuilding the houses. Now that Alexei is gone, we don't anyone to help."

"Actually," interrupted Darwin. "I know just the people to help."

 ** _A few hours later_**

A white van parks in front of the breeders house. On the side of the van, is marked "A.C.M.E. Exterminators". A large male walks out of the van, it's Ben, the scientist. Two other guinea pigs hop off the van, Blaster and Juarez. Blaster has a patch on shoulder due to the bullet wound, and Juarez has a cast.

Blaster looks upon the breeders home, "This is where Darwin's at?"

Juarez nods in agreement, "A random house in the hills?"  
Ben interrupts, "Well guys, let's find him."  
They all walk together and knock on the door, no one answers. Ben puts his hand on the door knob, and it opens.

"Hmm?" remarked Ben. "Unlocked.."

The three walked inside the trashed home, transformed appliances still littered the area.

"Hello!?" hollared Ben.

They walk into the kitchen and spot the dried up blood from the breeder, and a broken glass door leading to the backyard.

"This place is seriously creeping me out," said Blaster.

Juarez stepped in, "Are you sure this is the place, Ben?"

"This is the address Darwin told me over the phone."

Blaster peeks out the back door and spots a guinea pig in the grass, "Hey guys, come look!"

Ben and Juarez catch up and also look out the backyard.

"I think we found it," said Ben.

The three look upon the village, many of the miniature houses destroyed. Ben walks outside, and hears a squeak, from a guinea pig. He looks down, it's Tibbetts.

"Why hello," said Ben.

Tibbetts squeaks back, but Ben doesn't understand.

He points out to Blaster and Juarez, "Guys, what's he saying?"

"He asking if we're the g-force people," said Blaster. He directs his attention to Tibbetts. "Yes, we are. What's your name?"

"Tibbetts, what's yours?"

"I'm Blaster, so do you know where Darwin is?"

Tibbetts looks up at Ben, "Follow me."

The guinea pig scurries towards the house near the back of the village, Elliot's home. Ben and the others follow.

"These houses are the perfect size for us," remarked Juarez.

Blaster agreed, "I think we just found our vacation spot, Juarez."

"No no, these houses don't have electricity.."

Tibbetts rushes inside Elliot's home, where the remainder of the village stuck around.

"Guys, they're here!" shouted Tibbetts.

Ben approaches the home and kneels down to the half destroyed house. Tibbetts walks back out, the remainder of the village follows. Ben reaches into his pocket and brings out several voice decoders.

"Take these," said Ben. "They will help me understand you."

Tibbetts, Ellis, and Hugo all grab one. Blaster and Juarez helps fit them on the various guinea pigs.

"C-Can you hear me?" asked Tibbetts.

"I can," answered Ben.

"Woah, this is so cool!"

"Anyway, to business. Where's Darwin?"

"Darwin's inside the house with Ven."

Suddenly a guinea pig, stumbles out of the home. It's Ven.

"Darwin!" shouted Juarez.

"No," corrected Tibbetts. "That's Ven."

He grabs a decoder and hands it to Ven. Ven puts it on.

He looks up, "You must be Ben."

"I am."

Blaster slowly moves up towards Ven, and stops in front of him.

"So you're the one," said Blaster.

Ven moves back in defense, "And you are, Blaster?"

Blaster looks upon Ven, wanting to attack, but knows the whole deal was a misunderstanding.

"I'm sorry for what I did," said Ven.

Blaster pauses, then accepts the apology. "You're good, my man."

Ven looks at Ben. "I'm pretty sure you want Darwin now, right?"

"Please," answered Ben.

Ven turns, "Doc?" He gestures to pick up Darwin.

Ellis tells some helpers to lift Darwin outside. They walk inside to grab the crippled pig, and bring him back out.

Tibbetts hands Darwin his decoder, "Hey guys, how ya doing?"

"Darwin!" Blaster and Juarez rush over to give Darwin a big hug.

He shrugs, "Okay guys, that hurts, please stop!"

"Darwin," spurted Juarez. "We thought you went AWOL."

"I actually would of been dead if it wasn't for these people."

"But these people kidnapped you!"

"Yeah, but I got to meet my mother, and Ven."

"Is he really your brother?" asked Blaster.

"Just look at him... Yes, he is."

"Alright," interrupted Ben. "We'll talk more on the way back, conserve your energy."

"Hold on," uttered Darwin.

Ben pauses.

"Ben, can you help these people? They are in dire need of attention."

"Darwin, we need to get back."

"Ben, my family is here, please."

"I can't bring all of them back to the lab.."

"I'm not asking you too, just give some support."

Ben sighs, "Okay, I'll send some supplies and people to help clean this place up later, let's just leave now."

"Thanks Ben."

"Let's just go."

Darwin turns, "Hey Ven."

Ven responds.

"I have a question."

Ven turns his head in curiosity.

"Take this seriously.. Do you wanna join us? Work for the government, and be part of an elite team?"

"What?"

"You clearly have the skill to make it far, after what you did."

Ven doesn't respond.

Darwin continues, "Join us, I would love to work alongside another brother."

Ven thinks hardly, looking over to the village. "I.. can't."

"Why not?"

"My place is here, people are here. They need me, and I need them. Sorry Darwin."

"Well think it over. If you ever need anything, you know where to call me."

"Will do."

Darwin gets picked up by Ben. He smiles at the villagers and makes his way out of the backyard. Blaster and Juarez follow.

Tibbetts walks up to Ven, "Why didn't you accept the offer? You are worth way more than this village."

"No, this place needs me now more than ever. It's my home." He looks over to Tibbetts, "Besides who's gonna keep you in check?"

"You've changed, Ven... C'mon, let's eat some lunch."

* * *

 **The End**

 **Don't worry. The book may be completed, but it's far from over. Ven will have many adventures, past and future. Also, this book is currently becoming a full animated film, check it out on the BlenderArtists website.**

 ** **Once again, Thanks for reading! For my first writing to pass 40k words is good in my book!****

 ** ** ** **The Story of Ven 2 will come in the near future, read the Epilouge********


	24. Epilogue

Epilogue

Three weeks have past since G-force have arrived. The village was near fully restored and cleaned up with debris. Ven now lives in Alexei's house, occasionally going to the backyard to visit the grave and remember all the great times they've had. Tibbetts got a seperate house rebuilt and lives with the lead pig. He often visits Ven and talk about adventures or anything in mind. Tibbetts really looks up to Ven now, almost as a brother. Ellis got his own house, specifically for doctoring things, as well as a house for him to sleep in. The shack with food got torn down with a replacment area that automatically dispenses food to the villagers. The breeders home got bought by the government, and used by Ben as a secondary base. Everything is well.

One rainy night, Ven and Tibbetts were chatting in Alexei's house. Suddenly, a digging noise comes from the backyard, Tibbetts was the first to hear. He notifies Ven, and walks towards the backdoor, slowly opening it. A few moments later, a loud gunshot, and a mist of blood.


End file.
